17" or 18" wheels

[Jordangvr4]

putting my car together need your comments...17" wheels or 18" wheels(not building a race car)have jdm bumpers w/h+r drop.............What do you think I should go with!

 

You should go with General discussion forum and 17's. This is happening alot today!

 

[HHIVR4]

Noobs.. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/banghead.gif

 

[Polish]

17

 

[rheckert]

17

 

[belize1334]

I actually think that 16s look really good with a meaty 225/50/16 tire on these cars. I've got a set of 17s too that I ran with 45series and that's as low a profile as I'd go on the street. IMHO 18s just look silly.

 

[icurunnin]

I ran enkei evo 5's on a 225/45/18 and it looked great. I like a bigger wheel and tire combo to help with our (gvr4's) retarded gearing.

 

[mikus]

I prefer 17's for looks, but 16's for better all-round driveability

 

[turbowop]

Mine are 12's but I keeps 'em clean. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hsugh.gif

 

Quoting belize1334:
I actually think that 16s look really good with a meaty 225/50/16 tire on these cars. I've got a set of 17s too that I ran with 45series and that's as low a profile as I'd go on the street. IMHO 18s just look silly.


+1 I've looked into this but of course priorities are toward the motor/suspension/tranny. Looks come last. I would go with a 16" with a meaty tire as quoted above.

 

[Struc]

I'll post my agreement that 17 is probably the largest you should go, and 16's look great too.

Going to be picking up some used 16" Rota Slipstream's for 56/1000 soon. Can't wait to see how they look.

 

[VR4ownzU]

16s....performance and looks. 17s are okay. 18s are too big.

 

[BluFalcon]

Go with the 17's. 18's look kind of ridiculous on the car.

 

[Dialcaliper]

16's unless you absolutely must have wider than a 7.5 or 8" wide rim and 225 tire. If you must have 235-255 and want to squeeze in 8-9" rims, 17 is the way to go.

Any tire less than about 45-50 profile (You can get away with 40 on wider tires in our size range) will be too stiff to provide good grip off of smooth a race track - you won't be able to maintain the full contact patch on your average mountain road.

Actually, sidewall height is what matters - you want at least 100mm of meat between the rim and the road. 100-115mm is about the sweet spot for a street car in our weight range. Lighter cars can get away with a little less, heavier cars need a bit more.

As far as appearance goes, 16's look appropriate for the car, 17's look a bit more aggressive. 18's simply look silly.

Also, 16's with 225/50s are a very economical combo. Jumping up to 17's and 235+, you'll be spending more for wheels, and close to twice as much on tires

 

[Chief_Mak]

keep in mind also that if you go 18's, you might not be able to use your spare tire if you need to since there will be a significant size difference which is really bad on AWD cars. 17's with 45 series tires are just a hair off stock overall tire height.

 

[BlitzVR4]

I don't think 18" wheels look silly on our cars. Here is a pic of mine.

 

[turbowop]

Those look pretty nice. The whole car looks nice actually. That pic makes me want to tint my windows. BTW, the color of your car looks darker than factory belize, similar to mine. Did you have it resprayed?

 

[Struc]

Somebody lighten that picture... I can't see a damn thing.

 

[turbowop]

Maybe adjust your monitor? I see it just fine.

 

[Gordian79]

In NYC? 16's unless you like having flats all the time.