Hay Rake Tires, Any Preferance?

Okay, so, I have a McCormick Deering No.5 (I think) 8 foot rake, on rubber tires. It has 4.00 x 9's on the rear, which I THINK are still good, however the tires on the front are shot!

Right now it has 5.90 x 15 BF GoodWrench's on it, 8 or 10 rib implement tires. I just so happen to have 2 5.50ish x 15 Volks Wagon "all terrain" tires on the front of a Case. They have relatively good tread on them, would they work on the rake?

I am sure that the tires will go on alright, but I don't want to be sliding the wheels!! I also have tire chains that will fit that size if needed, but I really don't want to have to "chain up" in the middle of a 100* July Day!!!

What do you think? Should I buy some implement rib tires, or give these a shot? Also have some Tri Ribs in great shape, but I think that they would slide?

Any chance you can find some older pickup tires with lugs? Im betting implement tires could get to slipping if you have too much hay going through it. I think there has been a lot of them used with car tires on them.

Go find a set of 185/195/205x 15 car tires.Best if you get some with 'snow tread'.If not,Thats OK.My IH # 15 and #35 rakes just have regular automotive tires.I get em for free from the "M&I" pile at our tire shop.I also save the 'take offs' from our cars when they get new tires.Really cant see the rake tires in the pic.But I thought you would enjoy the SuperM.

Yep some snow tires should be fine.

BTW,A smaller tire will let the basket turn a bit faster.Not a lot,but it helps. All you need is to carry the basket high enough to keep it out of the dirt.I put (195/205)14" tires on my two rakes.

Had a rake like that and used 7.50x15 tires with no problems

Thats what I have that are on the case, 195 x 15 "all terrain" or something like that... Maybe you can see them in the picture here, nice little Case anyway though!

I own the same rake IH No. 5 alright.
My rake has Mobil Home tires on it. Got the rake teeth from Sloans express. Bearing from a local bearing store. bjr

14 inch garden tractor tires installed backwards? We used to use that setup on several ground driven machines - planters, drills, spreaders...

Same exact rake I learned to rake hay with behind a 656. Only front tires we ever had on it were car tires. Only thing we ever did to it was replace some teeth. Back then we got them at our IH dealer, but I am sure now you could find them cheaper aftermarket. Worked good for us.

We have a JD 640 rake with single front tire. Its a car tire. Works just fine.

Dito on the used snow tires for extra traction to keep the rake turning in heavy hay. Lower tire pressure too. That is a light implement, so they don't need a lot of air pressure to carry the load.

Just install the same size tire on each side of the front axle so the rake will be level and you'll be good to go.

5 or 10 lbs should do the trick right?

If black and round, they'll work fine for a hay rake.

I'd try for 10 to 12 PSI to start, enough that you don't have to worry about rolling a tubeless tire off the bead in a sharp turn. Out in a hay field it's easier to let air out of a tire if needed than to add air.

I would not want to go with anything less than a 205 75R 15 for size, that will keep the real turning fast enough, small will make it turn faster and be turning it too fast and try to bust up the hay and rake instead of rolling it over. That looks like the detachable link drive chain that the earlier models had, not the roller chain later ones had. Yes it is a McCormick No. 5 rake and only one other number rake (forget right off model) had teeth that would fit, they are an odball tooth. And orignaly probably a lot of them had the 16" wheel that was prety much standard for years and the 6:00 X 16" tires that were use was fighred at 28" diameter and that 205 75 15 will be very close to that size. Our rake of the same style was a David Bradley with 6:00 x 16" smooth summer tread car tires and no slipping problems. Your biggest problem will be from putting on too small a tire and having to idle along in 3 gear in that C instead of being able to shift to 4th gear at a third throttle. As long as you are raking only swath mowed and laying hay you will be OK, just when you try to go over the top of the winrow to either turn for drying or to put 2 rows together to make a bigger row will you have problems as the front axle does not have enough clearance. That is why the one I have setting here will be parted out as because of that axle clearance they will not sell, dealer still has the one I rebuilt 2 years ago setting on his lot because of that. This one was bought just for that odball tooth to finish fixing up the other one. Now I could redrill the position of the holes that hold the teeth on to use a more common tooth that axle makes it not worth wile to do so. If it could be converted over to a high axle with a drive chain on each wheel then it could be a good rake. And keep matched tires on both sides so that the drive pawls in the wheels do not keep ratchiting all the time and one wheel doing all the pulling. And keep the tire pressure up to the 28 pounds that was called for in the operators instructions.

You will need a good off road mud tire on that right front drive wheel. Look for and ols "snow tire like a Suburbanite.

We raked for years with a JD side delivery similar to your rake and only had 15" car ties on the drive wheel and it worked fine a couple tractor tread tires reversed would probably get better traction and look cool.Also a narrow tread on something like a rake will get better traction than a wide tread.

Thats kind of what I thought, because being that it is so light, too big of a tire would allow for much more flotation!

I am going to try to find me some 6.00 x 15 somethings.... If I can find them cheap enough, I will use them, but if not, I will probably just run the ones I have that are on the Case. I think that they should be alright?

I'd try the Case wheels and tires and see how they do before spending any $$$ on something else.

Can't use the wheels, will have to swap the tires, but the rake is sitting on blocks with no tires on it, and they have to come off of the Case so that it can have brand new tri ribs on it come spring. May try to do that today.. Hope I don't pop a tube! :

Thanks for the advice!

That 6:00 X 15" will make problems being too small, Go with a larger tire as the 205 but make sure it is not anything but a 75 series, what it ment by a wide tire is a 70 or 65 series tire that will not have the diameter you need for it to work as shoud and that wider does not have the traction that the narrower does have.