VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1933-1936 33 Chevy New Tires, the Good and Bad, Spare Tire

I got my new Goodrich whitewalls, new tubes and liners. The good is, the tires look really nice, the whitewalls are really white, they look like quality tires. I bought 5, my spare looked really old. I got them all mounted.

The bad is, the spare tire cover that fits on the rear of the car will not fit the new tire, even after letting the air out, the tire is just a little too big around. I am going to try one of my old whitewalls and see if it fits or just use it without the cover. If I go to a car show, I could put the old spare back on with the tire cover.

Anyone got any other suggestions for the spare tire cover?

Thanks,

I run an old tire (nice looking) for a spare, hidden under the cover, holds air and I hope I don't need it.

That is what I am going to probably do. You car looks really nice!
If I can figure out how to post pics, I'll put some on here of my car.

I assume you got the BFG 550-18 tires which are just a bit larger then the original 525/550-18 tires that came on the 1933 Master, since I have not seen a BFG 525/550-18 available from any of the current suppliers

I am not sure, but there could be a similar issue with the Lester 525/550-18 tires fitting under the tire cover. They look a lot larger then the original 525/550-18 tires from years past. The Lester tires look like any are actually a larger sized tire that is marked as 525/550-18.

I am planning on getting new tires for my 33 Master in the next year or so and plan on going back to 525/550-18 Blackwalls, since I don't like the larger looking whitewalls the suppliers are now selling and I want them to fit under my tire cover. I have compared the tires at Hershey and there is a significant size difference in some of them, even ones marked 525/550. Some of the smaller looking 525/550s are only available in Blackwalls.

My old tires were Bedfords, dated 1996, I thought they were older than that and my old spare was an Armstrong which is very old. I measured both of them and outside diameter is 28 1/2 inches, the new BFG tires are right at 29 1/4" I could not find any whitewalls that were 28 1/2 inch.

I checked with Bedford and they don't make that size anymore or I would have bought those. The whitewalls still looked pretty good and have only been really cleaned once other than just washing.

The original 1933 Master tire size was 5.25X18. Are the new tires 5.25-5.50 18?
Years ago the .25 tires were discontinued and replaced or combined with a .50 size.

The old size is 5.25/5.50 -18, the new tire size is 5.50-18.

The width is not the problem though, it the total diameter, the new tires are about 3/4 of an inch larger in diameter, the cover barely starts on the tire and gets jammed.

I had the same problem with Firestone tires on my 1934.

I went to a local truck tire shop and had them shave the tread on a used tire til it fit my cover. Trucks and oval track cars do this when their tires are out of round or shaved for an oval track.