after the arizona run my wife wants me to get bigger tire for the X. I currently have 31 on with a 5 speed standered tranny and 3.55 gears. well I read somewhere in a thread that if I go bigger on tires say to a 32 or a 33 that I won't like that power loss with a standered. so I would have to change the gears. I know you don't know if I'll like it or not, but are we talking major power loss or what . this is an everyday driver and also drive it to any 4x4 runs and pull a small pop up camper.

thanks for you help

You will want to change your diff gears to 4.10 or 4.56 if you go with 32s or larger.

How does it feel now? You may be able to live with 3.55 and 32s, but if you go with 33s you should definately regear IMO.

right now it has great power can't really tell a difference from stock tire to 31. ( don't know if i should ) but it has great take off and highway speed.

Ive run 33s with 3.27 gears and a friend of mine with an explorer runs 3.27s and 33s offroad. its not the best but its doable.

I ran 33's with the stock 3.73 gears and a 5 spd for about a year before I re-geared it to 4.56. You will notice a BIG power loss and 5th gear will become a thing of the past. My advice would be to re-gear your Explorer when you get the bigger tires, especially if you tow a trailer!

okay thanks guys, I guess I'll start checking into gears to.

anyone else run 32 or 33 with 3:55 gears or lower?

Yep I'm runnin 3.55's in the rear and 3.27's in the front on 33's. I have a manual transmission as well. I dont even use fifth gear on the freeway at all. Occasionally when I'm going down a long hill and I want to get some speed I will go into 5th, but my truck doesnt like to go fast anyways, so I just kick it in fourth and go like 65-70mph or so. Off the line it sucks ceeock. Its not too bad when its just me, but driving around with 2 other 150lb dudes last night kinda sucked. Definitely I will regear, but I have done plenty of runs with this setup. You definitely can't crawl as slow as you want to, and 2wd is pretty worthless unless youre hauling ass.

You definitely wont be using 4wd high at all. The only time I shift into 4wd high is when I am shifting between 2wd and 4wd low.

So basically, forget about any pickup off the line, forget about 5th gear like that dude said, and forget about 4wd high.

Good luck