Different strokes for different folks. There's a pretty large movement for "stance" where the enthusiast pays particular attention to the wheel fitment and ride height to achieve the desired aesthetic. 17x9's are a perfect solution for properly filling the wheel wells on MINIs to achieve the desired stance.

All comes down to personal opinion, but it is in fact possible to fit 17x9's without any problems.

 

I'm old and dense ,sorry, but I like the tire tread to be as close to the width of the rim as possible, and don't understand the extreme stretching . The 225/35's had a 9" rim as acceptable per Tirerack, and if I could use 1" more width towards the inside and 1" towards the outside compared to my 7inchers it seems that I would be close to having enough clearance . The tires would be even with the lips or sticking out maybe an 1/2" that shouldn't look too bad. I'd have to figure out my offsets because it would be close and if needed I could run spacers.

 

You'll understand "stretching" a lot more once you tried running 245's on a 17x9 on a lowered MINI. You'll be knocking the arches off and rubbing all over the place.

Stretching is about clearance so you can lower a car on wide wheels. Simple as that

 

ummm 245's .... seriously thanks for the explanation , I thought it was a lowrider cosmetic thing

 

Looks like with an offset of 20mm on the 9inchers and an offset of 42mm on my 7inch 5Zigens the 9 inch wheel will stick out about 2 inches more than my 7s which might be too much to look right , the clearance on the inside should be OK. I need wider lips? Am I doing something wrong here on the figures?

 

9 et20 will poke a good deal. Not gonna work well without stretch. You would poke 5 mm more than the car posted below. You can see they have stretched the tire to avoid rubbing. Yours would be poking more and you plan on running wider tires at the same time. Not a good combo.

 

this is what I'm looking for .

 

heres something I might look into.



http://www.carshine.com.au/index.htm...%20Styling.htm

 

It helps that that car has heavily widened arches

 

Too bad the aftermarket decent fitting inexpensive plastic wide arches never took off. Must have been the tie-ins with the Aero bumpers that killed them.

 

I've stuffed 245/35R18 onto the R56, on a 18x8 +45 wheel with a 3mm spacer to make it +42. (We needed the spacer because the tire contacted the strut without it.) It didn't quite fit -- rubbed the plastic arches under any kind of heavy suspension compression. With trimming of the arches it might work, but I'm not sure how much trimming you'd have to do.







--Dan
Mach V

 

wow thats close, but the 245/35/18's are 24.8" tall by 9.7" wide and the 225/35/17's are 23.1 tall by 9" wide so that should help

 

225/35R17 is more than 5% smaller than stock. Sure, it's an easy fit, but your gearing is all out of whack, your speedometer is more than 5% off, and your ground clearance is reduced. I'd run a 235/40R17 instead.

--Dan
Mach V

 

235 on a 8" wheel might work. Definitely not on a 9" though.

 

what are these wheels/tires?

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...ronzegrid2.jpg

 

Rota Grid

 

wonder what finish? Sport Bronze?

 

I figured about 2" sticking out more than the wheels I have now, thats about 50mm more

 

Rota Grid, 17x7.5" +45, with 215/45R17. Royal Sports Bronze.

--Dan
Mach V

 

looks good ,I'll probably go with that combo, maybe some spacers too

 

Rally,
Do you have any more pics of this MINI??? I love the look and want to know the specs of the wheels, and tires.

wheel width, offset, tire size, etc.....

Thanks!!!

 

here you go

 

these tires look OK at 225/45/17
http://www.vadriven.com/forums/showthread.php?t=302880

 

They are too tall and will rub. Go with a 215/45R17, or a 235/40R17. A 225/40R17 would be ideal, but you can't get that size in a street tire. (Hoosier makes a race slick in that size.)

--Dan
Mach V