Custom Wheels / lowering [Advice Please]

[rossmilstein]

My car desperately needs new tires. They may still have 1981 air in them.
I want larger wheels, but can't afford to lower the car right now, but will do so in the future.

What size wheels do you recommend knowing that the car will be lower in the future and I don't want a wheel/tire drama down the road?

Thanks for any advice.

:Ross
VIN 0911

[Farrar]

My car was lowered at least two inches and still used the stock wheels.

[sdg3205]

You don't need new, larger tires or rims to lower the car. Is there another reason? Save your money, avoid the drama and invest in one of the vendors lowering/performance suspension when the time comes.

[Nicholas R]

Installing larger rims and lowering the car are for the most part, two mutually exclusive things. Rims/tires for the most part only aesthetic. Yes, larger rims can give you more options if you're looking to redesign your brakes, or want an easier time finding matching tires, but mostly its all about looks. Lowering the car is all in the suspension. That's all about your spring/shock combination and setup.

A bigger rim and tire setup could potentially fill out the wheel wells more, but in reality, it wont have any affect on the ride height of your car. If anything, larger wheels could actually raise the car.

[rossmilstein]

If I want to go 18 and 17, but 17" are only available, could I do that in front and back, or am I asking for a whole lot of trouble?
Thanks for your help in making this decision.
Also does anyone know a company who's wheels fit our car with little or no modifications to the car other than XXR? Thanks! Ross





Installing larger rims and lowering the car are for the most part, two mutually exclusive things. Rims/tires for the most part only aesthetic. Yes, larger rims can give you more options if you're looking to redesign your brakes, or want an easier time finding matching tires, but mostly its all about looks. Lowering the car is all in the suspension. That's all about your spring/shock combination and setup.

A bigger rim and tire setup could potentially fill out the wheel wells more, but in reality, it wont have any affect on the ride height of your car. If anything, larger wheels could actually raise the car.

[Nicholas R]

If I want to go 18 and 17, but 17" are only available, could I do that in front and back, or am I asking for a whole lot of trouble?
Thanks for your help in making this decision.
Also does anyone know a company who's wheels fit our car with little or no modifications to the car other than XXR? Thanks! Ross

You can do whatever you want, it may just look kind of strange. There was someone at one point that modified a set of rear rims so he could put them on the front and have the same 15" rims all the way around. Some liked the way it looked; Personally I wasn't a fan. I think that the design of the car has an overall slimming effect from front to back, and the change in rim size accentuates that. The DeLorean world tour team used the same size Rims and tires on all 4 wheels so that they could each carry a full size spare that would fit any wheel. I dont think they were concerned about look at all, only function. I dont think they had to modify the car at all for it, nor did they run into any issues handling-wise, and they went all over the world. They also used steel rims so they could be easily repaired if necessary.
http://sfcitizen.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/7J7C1847-copy.jpg

Also it depends what you mean by wheels that fit on our car. Just about any rim with a 4x100 lug pattern will bolt up. Here's a list of cars that all use that same bolt pattern:
http://www.roadkillcustoms.com/hot-rods-rat-rods/Wheel-Bolt-Pattern-Cross-Reference-Database.asp?LugCount=4&StudSpreadInch=&StudSpreadMM=100#axzz4MsLTRZ9J

The issue we run into is the offset in the back. Even to fit the XXRs, you have to have wheel spacers because the stock rim has a deep recess where the rim actually bolts up. You have to add a thick spacer in there to make up the difference if you're changing rims. I think this is a case with just about any aftermarket rim aside from the DMC ones.

[DMCMW Dave]

Actually the suspension on the German cars was (were?) extensively modified to raise the cars as they were expecting some pretty awful roads on the trip.


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[Rich W]

Actually the suspension on the German cars was (were?) extensively modified to raise the cars as they were expecting some pretty awful roads on the trip.


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Special adapters/spacers were also used to fit the steel wheels, with different setups for the front and rear wheels.

[burch]

I believe the World Tour team also modified the flare on the front fenders as well. Part of that was to accommodate a transmission cooler, IIRC, and I believe part was for wheel clearance.