On all of Ford's media shots of the new Raptor, the tires are the LT315/70/R17E 121S KO2's. However, at least one of the trucks circulating around the show circuit and also Foutz' racing Raptor have 35x12.5R17LT 121R's installed - also the new KO2's. Apart from a gnat hair's difference in size, all the specs on the BFG website for these two tires are the same, with the exception of the speed rating - R vs S. So, forgive me if I'm being stupid, but 1) why does BFG even make two tires so similarly specced, and 2) why would they put the tire with the lower speed rating on the truck, much less the race truck? Both are LT's. Load ratings are identical. There's nothing to indicate that the sidewall is any different. So what gives? What's the advantage of the conventional sized tire over the metric?
The tires used on Gen 1 were a Raptor specific tread compound and had a different speed rating. The Raptor tires were softer, wore faster and were more prone to chunking. That being said, the KO2 is a better tire in all regards over the KO. Wonder if the tread compound is a little different.
WAY too prone to chunking. This was after 100 miles of desert running in Nevada. Granted, I was constantly kicking the ass-end out and romping it, but I'd expect some wear to occur, not like this though.
This was after 520 miles of desert running from Reno to Las Vegas. Granted, right after I got my participation sticker and two selfies I put my Raptor back on the trailer and brought it down to Las Vegas.
I am actually surprised how well the KO2's do in the dirt. We had about 350 miles of dirt roads that were nothing for the Raptor but the rest was some of the nastiest rocky sections I have ever seen along with some other rough roads. One person on the radio summed up the nasty sections and what's a better choice... the rocks/whoops or slamming his car door on his dick? Which lead us to next years run... Dick Door '17.
Did I? About 1000 miles of driving (including 850+ to Moab) before going off-road with my tires and the picture above shows them with about 6k on them including the Silver State run.
I had DuraTracs as my winter tires, setup on the stock wheels. I was running these until they were toast and was going to upgrade, but traded it in like that instead, lol.
I sent an email to BFG asking this same question and they wrote back saying that there definitely is a difference between these two tires. But according to them, the metric sized tire is better for sand and soft dirt, which seems backwards to me. I mean, why would Foutz swap out the metrics for conventional if the metric is better for sand? I've asked them to confirm that and also to give me more info on why exactly one is better than the other for certain situations.
I had good luck with my OEM KO's. They went 31k with off-road use and it just got to the point where they would not hook up at all in the dunes. They had maybe 7-10k street use but were useless for off-road. They were also nowhere near as chunky as @Jimbo either.... must have been driver error.