I'm just wondering how the original poster has never seen any of the race minis on this site.......there is a specific area for all the racers even. A bit slow it seems.

 

Would it be analogous to ask why do some people wear sneakers if they don't run marathons?

 

If the car can handle the extra weight go for it. But I know from experience the R90's that came on my car from the start were overwelming the brakes especially with a passenger in the car.

if it wasn't for that, I would still be running R90's. No, probably not. The width is too narrow and offset too conservative for my real taste.

They sure look nice in 2D from the side though.

 

I'm sorry, but you're an id#ot and whine more than my 5 yr. old kid. NO ONE TOLD YOU TO READ ANY POST!!!!!!!!! So how is that wasting your time? Seriously, if you're time is so valuable and if you are a smart person, you should've loaded your race car and practice your racing lines vs. reading NAM post. Now you're going to finish in last place again. Just kidn' - good luck in your race!!

I'm new to the forum, so much to see, I haven't had time to check-out the race section.

But regardless of race/street racing comment, some of you guys turned my question 360 degrees. Cause until now, no one is able to answer, how do you "feel" the wheels are lighter when driving? Some said, you can feel difference in braking, I disagree. When I drive my Honda, I can feel the brakes SU#K big time, when I drive my AMG, the brakes are AWESOME!! But I can't feel the difference with the weight of the wheels. Not being sarcastice - just being honest.

Second, not trying to start an arguement (what for), I just want to know if I decide to spend $1,200/ea. on HREs for my AMG, I want to feel the difference in weight (while driving). I don't want to feel the brakes or tires handle well. Cause if an avg. driver can't tell, then there really is nothing wrong in buying heavier wheels - save a lot of us plenty of cash.

So bottom line, buy what you like and don't worry about what other people say.

 

wow... you'll fit right in around here. keep it up.

back to m|u for me.

 

The Mini is especially sensitive to wheel weight, lightweight FRONT wheels appear to make a rather large difference to the 'flickability' around town, they also make a difference to the way that the brakes feel and the way that it follows the cracks on the freeway.

I would not say that I can feel 2-3lbs difference, but I absolutely can feel the difference between 15lb and 23lb wheels even on my 22 mile commute.

My 'other car' is even more wheel weight sensitive, the stock wheels are 12lb 15" on the front and 16lb 16" on the rear. It shares a PCD and offset with the Mini, so as a test I tried the Superlights on it and the difference was dangerous - it was actually hard to turn and stop it, the difference was obvious just driving down the street.

On the flip side I have driven my wife's BMW with two different sets of wheels and there was absolutely no difference whatsoever from the drivers seat driving it on the street - one set looks much nicer than the other though.

I would guess that 10lbs / wheel makes a big difference to a small, light FWD car, or a sub 2000lb sports car, but makes little difference to the experience when you have a lot more weight and technology disguising the road - for example on an AMG Merc.

If you want to spend thousands on lighter wheels for the Merc it is only going to (arguably) benefit the looks unless you get it out on the track and start to push the envelope, but in my opinion it is really not going to make a big difference to the way that a big heavy car feels.

 

It's pointless to compare a Civic to an AMG and then say that you don't notice differences due to wheel weights. The cars are going to feel different from each other regardless of which wheels either of them is wearing. You have to compare what the same car feels like with different wheels and tires on it.

I don't know what you want. Several people, myself included, have said that we felt a noticeable difference in ride quality, braking reaction and steering response when we put significantly lighter wheels (or heavier wheels) on our cars. That directly answers the question you asked. WE are the ones who drive our cars regularly, so WE would be able to tell if we thought the car felt or behaved differently.

I think you're really just looking for reinforcement of your last statement, i.e.: it doesn't make any difference, and buy what you want. Well guess what. Wheel/tire weight DOES make a difference. It may not be a significant or necessary difference, and you may not give a #!@* about the difference(s), but it's there. Buy what you want. If you want to ignore everyone's input, then fine, but quit giving people a hard time for answering a question you asked.

 

Thank you!!

And some of you guys are very sensitive - lighten up, life is too short to argue with me. Believe me, I've taken all the feedbacks into consideration, just because I disagree with brakes comment does not mean I DO NOT believe you guys, I'm sure what you guys said are all true. But as guy who drives less than 100miles a week, I just want to learn more about performance and handling. And this question happened to pop-up.

God bless,
Trace

 

How can you possibly come to any conclusion about the contribution of the wheel weights? You'd need compare light/heavy wheels on the same car (even using the same tires).

 

Not to belabor the point but what the hey ...

1. If your racing and its your business. You make investments in whatever because is how you make money. A racing team is going to buy ... whatever as investments to make money. Its not "too feel good"
2. If your doing it for a hobby, yeah it makes you feel good
3. If your just annoyed by a harsh ride, sure it makes you feel good but that is more in line with the old "what makes workers more productive". There was some old thing where Process Improvement people wanted to make workers more productive. So if they removed workers complaints would they be more productive? No, all it did was make them stop complaining about whatever they complained about. Its probably an obscure point but ... once the complaint went away, they would never think about the new tires again. It's not really "too feel better"

But what they heck. Its all good

Now that is very confusing.

You can't compare MINI brakes with AMG brakes. Not even close.

Did you ask this question on an AMG or MB forum? An answer for a FWD MINI with a tiny bit of HP compared to a RWD big HP V8 or whatever, not even close in being able to compare answers. I would imagine you would need the expertise of other AMG owners of the exact same model you have who have done the same thing. No? You could probably drop 200 pounds off the AMG and not feel a thing in your butt dyno on the street.

 

I get the feeling what is bothering people about your post is your wording. The way you are saying "you do it because it makes you feel good" comes across as condescending over the internet. It's just a blanket statement. Technically you do everything in life because it makes you feel good. You wouldn't do something knowing it would make you feel bad, unless you knew it was a sacrifice to make some one else feel good or maybe yourself in the distant future.

That wording just doesn't sit well with me. I improve my car because (with wheels mods or whatever) to full fill goals I have set. It might make me feel good i guess... but again moot point. I think the over all goal is to get more out of the car for whatever reason. To lessen lap times, better street performance, better looks or whatever the reason. I mean why did you buy a cayman chows? because you wanted to feel good. Maybe deep down this was the case. But the real reason is you wanted a sound vehicle that performed well, made sense to own and was fun to drive.

Having fun makes you feel good i guess. But just using this as an answer to the question is just a way of shutting it down leaving no room for some one else to interject an opinion. ie... condescending.

 

Does weight make a difference? Yes. How much and under what circumstances is a matter of opinion. If you can feel the difference and you like it great! If you can't feel the difference and you still like it, great. If you think I'm stupid because I don't care, great, too. I just don't need to hear about it.

 

By the way, some on this thread did go to lighter wheels while using the same car/brakes/tires. That is the only way you can evaluate the effect of wheel weight, and they reported what they experienced.

 

I don't think any one thinks you are stupid. I think a few of us find it odd that there are people in this thread that are posting that upgrading your wheels is pointless and they have run nothing but stock wheels.

On the flip side people that have upgraded from stock wheels of course are going to defend their purchase. They clearly would have justified it.

You have to take it with a grain of salt. My lap times and road manners changed when i changed my wheels/tires. New rubber only or a combination of new rubber and less weight? who knows.

 

I agree. If you look at my first post here in this thread, I think I reflected my view, which is pretty much, you do your thing and I'll do mine. But some people look at things like: "If I did it, it's smart and everyone should; and, if I didn't, it's stupid and if you do it, so are you."

 

A good wheelset weighs around 1500 grams or around 3 pounds. A big difference is a couple hundred grams. That's a much smaller percentage of the wheel weight than the case for a car.

Total mass of bike+rider might be 200lbs (more in my case, less in other's cases), car 3000lbs. But since it's rotating mass, you can't just consider the static weight, but you'd have to calculate the kinetic energy added to either set of wheels to accelerate/decelerate.

Speeds are much higher for the car. Since the energy for rotation is proportional to angular velocity squared, that means the energy lost to speed change is higher in the case of car wheels.

So you could take the total power available for either, and figure fraction used to just accelerate the wheels. I bet it would turn out that it isn't a negligible amount for either. So my proposition that it's a suitable scale model to at least represent the ability to tell the difference would hold in that case.

 

Oh no, no, no, no, no... You're not getting off that easy, pal. You asked for peoples' experiences, knowledge and opinions. Then when we/they gave them to you, you *****-slap us because what you're really trying to do is get "approval" from us to buy some inexpensive boat-anchor wheels. Then when someone calls you on it, you say, "Hey, don't be so sensitive." When someone points out your borish behaviour, they are not being "sensitive".

 

Exactly. And then we were dismissed by the OP.

 

My track wheels are 15" 10.5 lbs forged wheels and I can't say that I can tell a whole lot of difference between them and the S lites.

 

Sage words, 70spop. And they give me a reason to use this:

 

Within the week, I am going to change from 15 inch R82s at 15.2 lbs to new MINI 16 inch R90s at 20.9 lbs. I like the look, and that is what does it for me. Ours is just an R50 daily driver, non-racer that was recently purchased with worn out stock Continentals. I'll be using General Exclaim UHPs at 205/55-16 tire size. The speedometer is currently reading high (per our Garmin GPS) and I'm hoping to get it close to perfect or more likely reading slightly low. "Trace" ..... This is a very interesting thread . I will comment accordingly after the change.

 

If you turn a question 360 degrees, wouldn't that be identical to your original question?




Guys, who cares. Its time to Hydro!

www.detailersparadise.com

 

Yes, except it will be dizzy.

 

All sounds impressive. Still doesn't change the point.

 

Pictures Ken in a funny straw hat cha-cha-ing around, shaking bottles of Hydro like maracas. "EV...erybody HYDRO!!!"