[Mk2] [Generic] Talking to Tony (WIM),.. not that important the wheel stagger

[steve b]

I've been getting really fed up trying to find some nice staggered 16" wheels in the offest I want. My new rev3 on 17"'s with no stagger except the rubber 215/235 handles like a pile of poo compared to my old rev2 on 16"'s.

Both cars have been lowered the same amount and the MR2 isn't very adjustable in the geometry department, although my old car was adjusted the best posible given factory options, the new car probably has never been aligned.

Chatting to Tony at WIM today I was telling him of my MR2 prblem (I was having the Mazda re-aligned post suspension swap). Tony though the wheels were not a problem he could sort it out if I made 2 purchases that together are cheaper than new wheels. A full set of EZ camber adjuster bolts and a set of Tein adjustable tension/ camber rods. He said with the above mods he could make an MR2 handle however I want.

Nice to know I thought

Here ends my search for new wheels

[skinthespin]

True up to a point, but remember whatever you do with geometry theres always going to be 60 % (ish) of the weight over the rear wheels, so you need wider rubber, which in turn needs wider wheels (if you want the tyres to work properly).

You can make the car handle how you want with geometry BUT to do that with an MR2 with the same size wheels all round you will reduce grip at one end to compensate for lack of rubber on the other, so you will reduce grip on the front to make up for the lack of rubber on the rear, so while the car will handle how you want it will not be achieving the maximum speed it could round a corner. Does that make sense?

[adam3442]

Wheels in motion is excellent, I can't recomend them enough if you want any geometry set up or wheels and tyres fitting.

They fill the tyres with nitrogen (at least I thinks its nitrogen) for free and have a really expensive tyre fitting machine that doesnt come into contact with the wheel when fitting the tyre.

Steve aka Doeboy on the MR2OC is arranging a geometry and rolling road day there PM him if interested.

Adam

[MR!! wren]

nitrogen? so err...... you mean air

[raptor95GTS]

nitrogen? so err...... you mean air

no nitrogen. Don't F1 cars use this as it's got less moisture than air so more predictability when the tyres (and the inflation gas) heat up?

As for wheels / tyres. I'm sure toyota used 2 different widths on the mk2 v the same all round on the mk1 for a reason. If you only want a 20mm difference in tyre widths then yes you can use the same width all round. I think most wheel places would rather sell a set of 4 same wheels as it's easier for them rather than staggered sizes esp on our PCD which matches with so many FWD / AWD motors.

[steve b]

nitrogen? so err...... you mean air

no nitrogen. Don't F1 cars use this as it's got less moisture than air so more predictability when the tyres (and the inflation gas) heat up?

As for wheels / tyres. I'm sure toyota used 2 different widths on the mk2 v the same all round on the mk1 for a reason. If you only want a 20mm difference in tyre widths then yes you can use the same width all round. I think most wheel places would rather sell a set of 4 same wheels as it's easier for them rather than staggered sizes esp on our PCD which matches with so many FWD / AWD motors.

oh don't get me wrong I'd prefer to have staggered rims, but i've really searched and I'm getting fed up looking so when Tony said get some camber bolts and caster rods an we can account for the non stagger it made me happy

[raptor95GTS]

toyota do camber bolts as well commonly known as crash bolts. About 4quid each for bolt / nut

[steve b]

toyota do camber bolts as well commonly known as crash bolts. About 4quid each for bolt / nut

Yes, they are smaller diameter so give "slop" in the suspension, you can get cam bolts as well that offer a bigger range of adjustment simply at a turn (about 20x the price mind).

I've got the Tein Caster/ tie rods now, at least they are in the post

[raptor95GTS]

toyota do camber bolts as well commonly known as crash bolts. About 4quid each for bolt / nut

Yes, they are smaller diameter so give "slop" in the suspension, you can get cam bolts as well that offer a bigger range of adjustment simply at a turn (about 20x the price mind).

I've got the Tein Caster/ tie rods now, at least they are in the post

slop isn't the right word, that's implying they don't do the job of holding the camber angle. True they are narrower in diameter, 3 sizes to choose from and require more torque to hold the desired setting but they hardly slop. As long as you are happy with how the car handles then that's all that matters

[steve b]

I didn't mean slop when done torqued up, but they work by being "sloppy", too small for the hole and therefore able to allow the strut to move about, allowing camber to be set. This is an inferior method compared to using a cam. I just ordered a full set of cam bolts

[MR!! wren]

nitrogen? so err...... you mean air

no nitrogen. Don't F1 cars use this as it's got less moisture than air so more predictability when the tyres (and the inflation gas) heat up?

As for wheels / tyres. I'm sure toyota used 2 different widths on the mk2 v the same all round on the mk1 for a reason. If you only want a 20mm difference in tyre widths then yes you can use the same width all round. I think most wheel places would rather sell a set of 4 same wheels as it's easier for them rather than staggered sizes esp on our PCD which matches with so many FWD / AWD motors.

and what's air made up of? does it really make any difference with road cars?

[raptor95GTS]

nitrogen? so err...... you mean air

no nitrogen. Don't F1 cars use this as it's got less moisture than air so more predictability when the tyres (and the inflation gas) heat up?

As for wheels / tyres. I'm sure toyota used 2 different widths on the mk2 v the same all round on the mk1 for a reason. If you only want a 20mm difference in tyre widths then yes you can use the same width all round. I think most wheel places would rather sell a set of 4 same wheels as it's easier for them rather than staggered sizes esp on our PCD which matches with so many FWD / AWD motors.

and what's air made up of? does it really make any difference with road cars?

makes no difference to road cars lol but does sound good on sales blurb

[skinthespin]

All I can say is if you want the maximum from your car and it to handle as well as it could you need a proper set up with correctly fitted tyres, just sticking some wide ones on the back on the same sized rim as the front is not the same as fitting them on correctly sized rims, they just wont work properly.

Either do it right or do it cheap.

[HighwayStar]

You don't need staggered wheels.... dependant upon what size diameter you want. Stay with 15's and get 7's all round then a 205 fits nicely on the front a little stretched to keep the sidewall 'straight' and help steering response and standard 225s on the rear. To keep the look just add 10-15mm spacers to the rear. Loads of style choices in 15x7s and cheap. £400-500 new all in I reckon.
Dont know why people go up a diameter size to only maintain a 225 on the rear.. I reckon it only makes sense if you're going up a few tyre widths and thats when you need the wider rims though the standard 225 itself would need a wider rim if you increase diameter and thus lower its profile.
That said I'd love to try a 15x7.5 front (215/50/15) and 16x8.5 rear (245/45/16) set up.

R.

[Tubby Tommy]

Just had my new wheels nitrogen filled, used to do 160mph, does 175 now!!!

[skinthespin]

I have driven my car on many wheel combinations, including 7.5 x 17 all round, I currently have 8.5x17 front and 9.5 x 17 rear, BUT the best combintion for pure handling by miles was 7.5 x 16 front and 8.5 x 16 rear.

The same size all round doesnt turn the car into an oversteery monster but if your driving on the limit then its massively compromised, as what ever way you look at it you have 60% (or there abouts) of the weight over the rear wheels, to get the handling back on track all you can do is get the rear tyres working hard and reduce the grip on the fronts.

If you care about handling and grip at all and especially if you want to drive it on track it really is worth the effort and expense of getting a staggered set up.

Also if a tyre isn't fitted on the correct size rim it wont be working correctly, so fitting a 20mm wider tyre on the back (if the rims are the same width) ISNT the same as fitting a 20mm wider tyre on a 20mm wider rim.

HTH