My Freelander 2 is still running on the 235/65 X 17 Good Year Wranglers that Land Rover put on it new but they are going to need replaced over the next few months so it's time to suss out what I am going to put on next.

As I am liking doing more of this Green Road nonsense I am keen to get a more off road biased tyre to aid the vehicle as much as possible on the various off road challenges whilst not being too horrendous on the road.

I know I can get the General Grabber AT’s easily enough in 235/65 X 17 size but I would really like to try and get something better off road like the Good Year Wrangler MT/R’s 235/65 X 17 but they seem to be un-obtainable now? I spoke to the guys at AJS and they said the General Grabber AT2’s were actually better off road than the AT's but again un-obtainable now in this size. They did suggest that the GG AT2’s are available in the 225/75 X 16 size which has the advantage of being a bit ‘skinnier’ as well as being a bigger tyre to slightly increase ground clearance but that would mean swapping wheels to 16”s and I don’t really like the 5 spoke 16” wheels that came on the base S model Freelander 2’s – Any other nicer options of 16” wheels that fit the Freelander 2’s?

Without going down the Remould / Kingpin type route any other tyre options I am missing?

Cheers…..

Uncleron wrote:

I spoke to the guys at AJS and they said the General Grabber AT2’s were actually better off road than the AT's

Well after a wad of research I have decided I'm going to stick with the General Grabber AT's....

Another thing I'm keen to try and increase is the ground clearance when I'm off road as I have already bent the fuel tank bracket & got a wad of 'chukkies' in between the tanks support brackets and base of the plastic tank before I fitted the Mantec Fuel & sump guards.

Across the various forums etc I have managed to find the universal feedback seems to be pretty positive on getting a bigger tyre for off roading in the FL2's so similarly to the link below I am going to go for Grabber AT's in the 245/70 X 17 size.

http://www.freel2.com/forum/topic10278.html

I also PM'd the guys that created that thread as it's the best part of 18 months old now but they were still well helpfull and positive about the overall benefits of the swap from 235/65 X 17 to 245/70 X 17.

That's the bigger GG AT's ordered now so be interesting & looking forward see how they look & perform both on & off road!

The General Grabber AT's I ordered in 245/70 X 17 arrived on Friday and I fitted them over the weekend and my first impressions are good - Both the size of them as well as the tread pattern give the car a much more purposeful look than than my Good Year Wranglers which only had about 3 - 4mm tread remaining.

A couple of pics ;







These tyres are certainly quite a bit bigger than worn standard ones ;





One of the main reasons I went for the GG AT's in this size was to increase ground clearance as much as I can and I purposely took these pics of the tyres installed which showed that you could not really fit any bigger tyres unless you were modifying the suspension too ;







The lowest part of my FL2 ground clearance wise is the Mantec tank guard which I measured on level ground before fitting the larger tyres and was approx 205mm. I measured the ground clearance in the same place after fitting and driving on the tyres and found the clearance had increased by 30mm to 235mm which I was pleased with. As in my other posting in the Maintenance & Modifications section I am doing this change in combination with fitting 20 / 25 mm lifting spacers within the suspension itself so I'm hoping to increase my FL2's ground clearance by slightly over 50mm all in which is a 25% increase which again I'm pleased with and for not a lot of extra cost if you need new tyres anyway.....

I drove the car for 150 road miles today and I am still really pleased with the result some thoughts are ;

1) With the radio off there is a bit more road / tyre noise around the 30 - 50 mph mark but not annoying.
2) Compared to the Sat Nav the speedo now reads spot on till about 50mph when the Sat Nav says 51mph and at an indicated 70mph the Sat Nav says 72mph.
3) On the open road I really don't notice much difference in the amount of roll or handling, maybe a shade less sharp in turning and probably the same comments on tighter roundabouts etc. My FL2 was running 17" tyres - the change may be more noticeable if transferring from lower profile 18" or 19" wheels to this size?
4) The car does 'feel' a bit higher but not convinced thats not just phsychological.....

My next off road event is this weekend at Butterbridge at the 'Rest and Be Thanful' near Inveraray / Loch Lomond in Scotland. I've been speaking to the organisers and there is no potentially paint damaging tight sections in this outing which I tend to avoid but there are some deep rutted sections so I'm looking forward to seeing how this goes now and glad to have these tyres on before I do it!

Hope this is at least of interest to anyone else considering options to increase clearance on their Freelander 2 and all credit to the guys in the link above with their previous research....... Cheers

Many thanks for that detailed post. I've been toying with doing exactly that for a while. That size bumps me up over legal here in Australia though. There are a huge number of modified 4wd's on the road here and the police seem to turn a blind eye. The law here states that you can't increase tyre diameter by more than 15mm but that size increases diameter by 37.5mm for a clearance increase of nearly 20mm...nice Do keep us posted on the spacers etc. Cheers.

What effect have your mods done to your insurance? Has it increased?

devondave wrote:

What effect have your mods done to your insurance? Has it increased?

Have you taken the new tyres off road yet?

[quote="crimdog81"]Have you taken the new tyres off road yet?[/quote

I did the Land Rover off road event today at Butterbridge and the new larger General Grabber AT tyres performed really well - No negatives at all off road I can think of and I certainly used but did not see any difference in the Terrain Response system with the larger tyres.

The GG AT's had a huge amount more grip than my previous albeit worn Good Year Wranglers on the slippery , muddy parts that always seem to surround the 'obstacles' on these off road events. With the larger tyres my FL2 also handled the deep rutted parts with no underneath contact and even very little 'brushing' from the undergrowth which I am pretty sure would not have been the case before I fitted these tyres.

Another bonus for me was in the confidence / fun factor today as I was just that bit more at ease that my FL2 would be able to handle any 'obstacles' that came along with the increased grip & clearance so I did really enjoy todays event - The FL2 somehow just felt a bit of a closer match to the Discos out there - Roll on the next event!

A real on this mod from me so far......

Ronnie, keep an eye on the SLROC website to see when their next open day is that non-members and any car can attend. Especially if they are having a Torphecan/ Bathgate/ Cairnpapple Hill day, that will give you every sort of surface to drive on from grass through mud to steep gravel climbs, no rock crawling though. I took my Evoque on the day you did last Sunday when the Evoque was only 36 hours old............ On 20" Craptinental Cross Contacts - a 100% road biased tyre, it had been pouring with rain for two days and we never had an issue with grip on any of the trails in the GGS mode of the TR How can carbon have a footprint, it has no feet?
Now driving - RRE Coupe Dynamic Lux Auto with Plus pack, Fuji White, Ebony, SD4 with tow pack
Gone - 2010MY FFRR TDv8 Stornoway and Ivory, Privacy - the pace of a TDv8 RRS, the incomparable grace of a Range Rover
Gone but will be missed- RRS Tdv8 HSE Stornoway Grey with Ebony Leather
Gone (only a little missed) RRS Tdv6 2.7SE Giverny Green/Aspen
Defender 90 County HT in Epsom Green

With the new GG AT2 in 245/70/R17 do you need to fit any spacers to fit them or can you fit them without any spacers?

Many Thanks

It's remarkably clean underneath considering that it goes off road. 3 x FL1 2 manual + 1 auto
5 x FL2 4 manual + 1 auto
Now Discovery Sport P250 MHEV SE

jamiefarm1 wrote:

With the new GG AT2 in 245/70/R17 do you need to fit any spacers to fit them or can you fit them without any spacers?

Many Thanks