Stainless

$200 a set? Give me a break. Buy a 10,000 shot canister of Airsoft plastic BBs, cut it into four equal quantities (about 10oz each) and throw each quantity into your tire. It's literally the exact same mechanism as this over-priced "kit," and bead-balancing has got decades of history. You can even put the BBs in sandwich bags, and put the whole bag into the tire... after about two miles, the bag explodes and the BBs spread out inside. I've bead-balanced two sets of tires. My 31x11.5 LTBs were as smooth as glass up to 75MPH, but my 33x12.5 Trxus MTs bring the suck. Sometimes, aggressive tires (especially Interco) just won't balance. However, the process is sound, and it's been used successfully by hundreds of wheelers. Some guys even use golf balls. Don't waste your money on a kit. S

No, you can't use the stock sensor, because it's a gauge sender. You need a temperature switch. You can buy overpriced aftermarket ones that have a capillary probe that you stick in the fins of your rad, or you can do some junkyard huntin' to find one from any number of different vehicles for about two bucks. I used one from an 80s VW Jetta... it screws into the rad on those models, as well as Audis, Saabs and some Volvos.. same switch. It turns on at 195 and off at 180 (if I recall correctly... the temperature is stamped on the switch in degrees Celsius. There are 180, 195 and 210 degree versions out there, so pay attention). Then, I went to Home Depot and bought a female brass fitting with the same thread size, and soldered it into the metal bleeder pipe in my upper rad hose (VG30). Some wirin' and a switch inside the cab to shut the whole thing down for deep water, and it's worked perfectly for two years now. Total cost, about five bucks. I've never personally seen one of those capillary tube probes fail, but I've heard plenty of stories. It seems like a half-ass to me to be getting a temp reading from the rad fins instead of the actual coolant stream. Plus, at least here in Canada, they're about $50. Oh, and also, I've been running two regular old 30A Bosch-style relays in parallel to power my Taurus fan since I put the thing in with no problems (low setting only). There's no need to buy some fancy ultra-high current relay **unless you plan to use the fan's high speed**, but do make sure that both relays have the same wire lengths if you go parallel. Plus, junkyard shopping is fun! S

I ran 31x11.5 LTBs on 7" rims and they wore fast in the tread centers. When you put tires on rims that are too narrow, it causes a balloon effect that affects your tread wear. The softer the tire, the more exaggerated the problem becomes. However, narrow rims also offer a mild beadlock effect, so you can run much lower pressures off road. As with most things, there are pluses and minuses. I'd hunt down a set of 8" rims for those tires unless you're building something that almost never sees the street.

You can't beat BFG ATs for on-road and mild off-road use. I'm in Canada, too, and my ATs were absolutely killer for snow wheeling. This past winter, my beat-up WD21 sold a few guys with fancy rigs on BFG ATs for winter stuff, and they're about as quiet and refined as 4x4 tires get on-road. Now, they do truly suck for sticky mud (instant slicks), but most tires that excel in the mud are terrible on-road (my summer LTBs are pretty brutal on the street and highway). BFGs are a little expensive new, but you can probably find some used from guys who are moving into something more aggressive. If you're in the Alberta area, send me a private message and I'll give you a heads-up on some forums for used stuff if you're not already familiar. S