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Supreme Being
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Willtx (1/31/2007)
Is there a 17x8 fitment in the pipeline? My poor old E30 M3 won't take a 9" rim. I rub badly enough with the 235/40/17s I have now I'm surprised to hear that. I'm assuming you are talking about the rear and with zero E30 experience I would have guessed that the wheelwell is large enough to fit a 9" or even a 10" wide wheel and a wider tire. Is the tire rubbing caused by the offset or is there just not enough room between the fender and the internal side of the well, regardless of offset? Is something else in the way? Or is this about the front well and suspension components? Just curious since 235 seems very limiting. Thanks.
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Supreme Being
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| I'm getting a mild rubbing on the fender lip in the rear under load. I'll roll the fenders and that will solve the problem, but If I lower the car a lot it will probably touch on the inside of the wheel well too. There's not a lot of room under there. And yes, the offset is correct. In the front, even with very conservative ride heights, it will rub on the fender liners and the frame rail at full lock. Keep in mind the stock tire was a 205/50/15, so a 235/40/17 is a whole lot more tire. You can run a little bigger in the rear if you don't lower the car, but that's it in the front. Some guys run 9" wheels, but you still can't run any bigger tire, so what's the point? Added weight? Of course, on Mod class race cars you get all custom flared bodywork and then you can run 18x10 all around, or even bigger.
________________________________________________________________________ Yes, I know my wheels are gold, but I DO have a car so check it. My name is Will and I like long walks in the rain...ahhhh my ankle!!! And I have a friend named Richie that abuses his powers.
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Supreme Being
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Supreme Being
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| Thanks for indulging me with the pictures. The picture with the right front wheel turned to the right looks like its been hit in an accident and forced past full lock. It looks abnormal.
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Supreme Being
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| Nope, that's just from turning in and parking. I think the camera angle accentuates it somewhat, but the steering, control arms and subframe are stock and within factory specs for the frame. Obviously the car is very low and it has added caster and camber. Cheers, Will
________________________________________________________________________ Yes, I know my wheels are gold, but I DO have a car so check it. My name is Will and I like long walks in the rain...ahhhh my ankle!!! And I have a friend named Richie that abuses his powers.
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Supreme Being
Group: Board Of Directors
Last Login: 9/3/2008 7:12:51 PM
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| Will... A lot of E36 club racers are going to jump on these wheels... I already have one set of Kosei K1 17 x 8.5s and plan to pick up another.. I just pawned off my other set of 15 x8s on an unsuspecting DE chair.  if we both keep an eye on bimmerforums, we should be able to snag sets of Koseis K1s in 17 x 8.5
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Supreme Being
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That's true, but I already have 28 15" wheels for my cars, and I'm planning on continuing to run Koseis on the race car with stockers and Panasports for rains, etc. I'm not going to 17" anytime soon. I love me some cheap 15" tires and a nice low race car. I was just thinking another light set of 17s for the street car would be nice, especially if the offset was such that I could run big brakes or something.
________________________________________________________________________Yes, I know my wheels are gold, but I DO have a car so check it. My name is Will and I like long walks in the rain...ahhhh my ankle!!! And I have a friend named Richie that abuses his powers.
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Supreme Being
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I can get ya'll a small price break on the Kosei's if you're interested.
-Greg
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Supreme Being
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Here's our decision summary, where we ended up.
After some research with both suppliers and users, we decided to:
1. Avoid spacers, and one size fits all fitments, and
2. Get the optimum wheel width for the tires we have.
On the '99 M3, we're running 235x40R18 in the front. Our decision time came with rear rubber replacements.
We decided to stay with the same brand and style of tire (g-force T/A KDW) as we found them working well in rain as well as in dry conditions.
So, when we reshod the rear, we stayed with the 255x35R18's that were on the car when we got it in September.
The gang at B. F. Goodrich recommended going with the wheel width specified as the wheel width used to measure the tread width in the tables. That made the decision a no-brainer.
With these tires, the tables call for an 8.5" wheel width in the front, and the rears, 9".
Had we wanted to go with wider tires than the 255's, we would have simply looked at the table for the "measured" wheel width for whatever larger width tire I wanted.
We knew, from previous experience, these particular tires didn't rub even tho there has been no rolling nor stretching. The car has a stock suspension.
However, the catch came with #1.
There seem to be lots of wheels that will fit with shims, spacers, rolling and/or stretching.
But, places like Tire Rack and Discount Tire simply didn't offer what I wanted without spacers, and in one case, the supplier couldn't even offer 8.5 in the front, but instead, claimed there would be "no difference" between that and an 8.O (which they had).
Worse, I discovered Tire Rack didn't even have the wheels they are now currently (as of today) advertising for 96-98 e36 M3's (uh, world, BMW made these babies in '99 - my build date being 2/22/99) and didn't expect to get any more.
Hmmmm.
Bottom line, we found a set that fit our requirements:
8.5 x 18 front, and 9.0 x 18 in the rear with the correct offsets (no spacers nor shims).
Interestingly, with the new wheels there is minimal tramlining compared to the previous 18's that came with the car, and pulling to the right, because of the slope of the road crown particularly on expressways, is almost gone.
There is none of this with the stock 17" wheels and tires.
The other surprise is that we seem to have more understeer now than with the previous 18" wheels.
Go figure.
At some point, we may get some 17"'s to put on the original wheels, with the same tire size all around to see what neutral steering is like.
Thanks for all your input on this.
Bill
Arlington
e36, 38, 39
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