Tyre upgrade - Is it worthwhile upgrading from LR 98 to Light Truck?

you need to keep in mind what the tyre placard on the vehicle states ,
anything less will deem the vehicle unroadworthy an possibly uninsured
do your homework
cheers mechpete

have never heard of a notice being fitted to the vehicle, its not just that simple ,the vehicle was built to comply with Australian requirements , for you to change that I would say you would have to have it engineered , the tyre placard is there for a good reason an must be adhered to
you need to check with the manufacturer an the tyre people
for clarification
mechpete

Bruce, there are number of different Yokies under the Geolandar label. The original fitment on Foresters - usually nicknamed Geosquealers - are one. They also do H/T and A/T styles in the Geo family.

In the (placard-matching) 215/65R16 size the GO12 A/T-S is 98H. These received decent reviews on that size/weight of vehicle and they seem preferred over Bridgie 697's by the Forester owners I've been in contact with.

It occurs to me that there are some practicalities to deal with.

As mentioned you have to deal with the load and speed ratings ........ seems there has been some flexibility allowed on these matters in recent years ........ Check out the road authority web sites.
It now seems the view on speed ratings is that 180Kmh should be sufficient for any road car given the speed limits.
It also now seems that as long as the load rating is adequete for the purpose, they are happy with that ..... remember that means a maximum possible load carried on the heaviest axle pluss a safety margin ( around 15% minimum from memory).

More of a problem will be the available tyres for that vehicle ... 205/65R16 is not a typical light truck form ..... more like a passenger tyre form ....... SO you may have difficulty or a reduced choice of tyres by the time you fill all the regulated requirements pluss the desire for a light truck tyre.

cheers

Brucek - The Geolandars with a 98 load index rating are not a light truck tyre.
They are an SUV tyre, with a slightly heavier construction than regular passenger tyres.
They are still rated as a passenger tyre.

If a tyre is rated as a "light truck tyre" it often (but not always) has a "ply rating" stamped in the tyre sidewall.
You can never rate a 6 ply tyre as an 8 ply - there's a major difference in construction, in the thickness/number of the cords.

Some light truck tyres rated under the TRA (Tyre & Rim Association) code (which is American) have "LT" placed before or after the tyre specification code (typically - LT265/75R16 - or 265/75R16LT if it's a high flotation tyre) - but a lot of tyres sold in Australia are rated under the European Tyre and Rim Technical Organization (ETRTO) - which does not use the "LT" coding.
The Euro-rating light truck tyres will carry a "C" designation in the tyre specification (typically, 215/65R16C)

The TRA-rated tyres have a Load Index that is a letter - Load Range A, B, C, D, or E.
The TRA letter code is an alternative load/speed rating code to the ETRTO and Metric code of numbers and letters (such as 98 H).
Euro-specification tyres are more commonly used in Australia today. The American market sees a larger percentage of TRA-specced tyres.

However, there is an increasing trend for tyres to be used on light trucks and utes that are essentially just heavier-rated passenger tyres.
These tyres will have a higher load index, but will often have a lower speed rating.

Unfortunately, there are at least 6 styles (and up to 8 styles) of tyre marking either currently in use, or used in recent times.

Here's some useful tyre marking information on light truck tyres;

Light truck tyre designations

Here are the tyre load and speed indicator codes;

Load & Speed indicators

Cheers, Ron.

Light Truck tyres will have the designation "LT" moulded somewhere on the tyre and many tyre size descriptors will LT included in them.

The short answer for your car is that you wil see a much greater advantage for your car by changing to p rated AT than you would from going from a P rated to a LT rated AT.
Yoko does a P rated AT in the geo 12 which would be ideal. I had the same construction tyre (265 70 16 doesn't come LT) on the Colorado which did central oz and the desert without a problem. They will be much more comfortable and perform better on your car than an over specced hard as nails LT. Ply rating have been under a 'deemed to be equivalent' regime for years now and underneath they are all much more similar than they ever were.

brucek, AFAIC there are two reasons to go from PC to LT: to have a higher load rating and to have a stiffer sidewall that's less prone to staking when you've aired down a bit.

I had an 08 MY Forester and yes the original Geolandars were pretty ordinary and wore fairly quickly. But you can nonetheless do a lot of dirt driving (corro, gibber etc) if you air down, keep to no more than 80 kmh and take care where the rocks are bigger.

In my state to go to AT LTs required a slightly larger tyre, 20mm diam bigger than stock, when legally a 15mm increase was the max. I was happy to live with that and used both D697s in LTs and Geolander AT/Ss. The Geos got a lot of driving in the snow and worked well at that with a surprising amount of grip on wet bitumen. The D697s got a lot of driving outback and performed well on gravel and in sand, with a load in the back and towing a camper trailer. I'd be happy to buy those again.

HTH.