I need a half tire

January 28, 2016 9:33 AM

So there's an exercise where one hits a truck tire with a sledgehammer. It's a pretty great workout. I'd like to get a tire at home, but I don't have space to accommodate a truck tire. You can however, buy a HALF truck tire online for what seems to be an exorbitant amount of money. If I go to a tire recycling place, how would I cut a tire like that in half? Secondly, does half tire actually work ok?
posted by aeighty to Health & Fitness (12 answers total)

Best answer: You could use an angle grinder with a cutting disk to cut a truck tire in half. It'll smell, so do it outside.
posted by Too-Ticky at 9:37 AM on January 28, 2016

Best answer: You can take a whole tire and bury half of it.

Many tire shops and recycle places will let you take a used tire for free if you ask -- they actually have to pay to dispose of them -- but they probably don't want you cutting a tire in half at their business.
posted by yohko at 9:41 AM on January 28, 2016 [4 favorites]

Could you get two free smaller used tires and duct tape them together to get the right size?
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 9:47 AM on January 28, 2016

You didn't ask this, but I'm hoping you'll be using this tire, whole or half, only outdoors? Because unless you have really high ceilings, I'm picturing some serious drywall and probably also floor damage, partly from swinging around that sledgehammer and partly from the tire.
posted by easily confused at 9:53 AM on January 28, 2016

Best answer: Sawzall would do it. (generically, a reciprocating saw) Or if you want a workout in itself, just about any fine-toothed handheld saw would be able to cut it.
posted by Mr. Big Business at 10:00 AM on January 28, 2016

Best answer: This is actually pretty tough. Side cutters for the bead, non snap utility knife across the side wall and a sawzall with a fine tooth blade across the tread (or side wall if it has steel belts there).

The instructions I followed.
posted by Mitheral at 10:04 AM on January 28, 2016

Response by poster: Thanks everyone, I'm starting to think that maybe $129 is not expensive for well used, half tire.


@Cool Papa Bell: Anything that's not heavy rubber/steel is going to disintegrate with repeated sledgehammer blows.. I tried :(

@Easily Confused: Definitely outside.

@Yohko: Love the idea, that would definitely work, if only I had somewhere to burry it :(
posted by aeighty at 10:42 AM on January 28, 2016

Have you thought about putting a whole tire to use (if you can get one for free)?
Tire Excercises
posted by cazoo at 12:22 PM on January 28, 2016

Best answer: Classic sawzall job. If you need to cut through some random thing, and you don't care about being particularly precise, a sawzall is the tool of choice. Put a 9" wood-and-nails blade on it and you'll fly through rubber, steel, and pretty much anything else.

An angle grinder would melt the tire and make huge amounts of horrible, noisesome smoke; don't do that.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 3:15 PM on January 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

For reference, I routinely use my sawzall to cut through roofs, involving multiple layers of asphalt-and-gravel shingles, plywood sheathing, nails, joist hangers, and framing lumber. Works great. I bet you can rent one at Home Depot or Lowe's for maybe $20 a day. A couple of blades will run you $8-$10.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 3:19 PM on January 28, 2016

Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The: ". Put a 9" wood-and-nails blade on it and you'll fly through rubber, steel, and pretty much anything else."

A wood and nails blade is way too course; the steel belts will easily fit into the gullets and just sort of vibrate back and forth. Instead a fine tooth blade in the 18-24 tpi range is required. It won't work as well on the rubber but it won't get hung up on the belting.
posted by Mitheral at 10:10 PM on January 28, 2016

Ehh, I concede that wood-and-nails is probably not the ideal blade for steel belts, but in my experience they do cut sheet metal just fine and a metal-cutting blade would probably make a mess of the rubber part of the tire. (I suppose you could use two different blades, but why bother?) You would want to come at it from an angle so that the blade isn't directly engaging with the edge of the belt, and also you'd want to cut through that part of the tire first so that the rest of the tire could stop them jiggling around too much, but honestly I've found that a wood-and-nails blade will cut through anything short of a 1/2" lag bolt, although hardened steel will dull it quickly. But when one part of the blade gets dull you just shift to another.

Anyway this is really overthinking it; just about any common blade would work, and cutting strategy mostly emerges intuitively during the cutting process. Sawzalling need not be a particularly cerebral activity. The difference between an optimal cut and a mediocre one is generally a matter of a few seconds and a shorter blade life. Blades are disposable and cheap.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:07 PM on January 29, 2016