Hello,

I am completely new to this and recently bought myself a 2006 MCS Works, thinking about running the following sizes wheels on stock JCW suspension:

F: 17x8 ET25 (205/40/17)
R: 17x9 ET25 (215/40/17)

Would that rub? Please kindly point me to the right direction.

Thanks

 

Alex from TireRack can probably give the best answers, but I would assume that yea, they will considering that the 8" width up front.

One question though, why would you run staggered sizes on a FWD car? This could create some handling issues, mainly introducing more understeer to a FWD car. This might be ok so long as you don't want to track the car.

 

Totally understand that the staggered sizes on FWD is massive understeer combo on MCS but guess it is depends on how I behave on the road. We dont have race track over here so it's ok and not going to race on the road. Guessing all I could do is have nice stance.

Thank you very much for the reply mate, appreciated.

 

Does your car have the JCW suspension (red springs)?

 

25mm offset's going to make those wheels/tires stick outside the wheel arches.

 

I agree that 25mm offset will probably be too little no matter the suspension and there will be rubbing on the rear wheel arches. Especially with 9" rear wheels.

 

Plenty of Minis running wheel/tire setups in those sizes. Rears will probably rub. IMO it will not look good at stock height.



BBS RS 17" 8" [F] & 9" [R]
Front = 32 Offset
Rear = 25 Offset
Falcon 912's
Front 205/40
Rear 215/40

 

While it might be possible to run staggered wheels on a rear wheel drive car like a Porsche or BMW, it is not suggested for a MINI that is FWD unless you are specifically interested in a wide rear wheel appearance- either for car shows or for fun.

Driving on the street the wide rear wheels are of little use since the MINI pulls from the front and also steer and brake there too. Overworking the front tires isn't going to be helpful (more understeer as mentioned earlier) and the heavy rear wheels and tires are just dragging along.

Better idea would be to use the same wheels front and rear perhaps 17x7 to 17x8" but with less offset than you mentioned due to the wheels sticking out (just under 1") with offset of 25mm.

JCW suspension still will leave some gap using stock tire sizes and you mentioned tires that are 40 series sidewalls which are smaller than stock so more wheel gap.

One solution is to use stock tires 205/45-17 or even 215/45-17. You'll still get decent handling but not as stiff a ride for street use and less wheel gap.

If you were to choose 17x8" wheels you can try for a offset of about 32 to 42mm. This will give you enough clearance from the suspension parts yet not stick out too far to rub.

 

Sorry for the late reply, I was way too busy with work haven't had much time to sort the MCS out.

My biggest concern is that if I run the following sizing:
F: 17x8 ET25
R: 17x9 ET25 (may be 17 x 8" ET25)

How much will the wheel stick out of the fender? According to 1010tires offset calculator against the original MCS wheel will have:

17 x 8" Front: inner clearance 10mm more and extend 36mm
17 x 9" Rear: inner clearance 2mm less and extend 48mm
(Seems like that is a little bit too aggressive will rub the inner strut for the rear?)

Looking at Coilover now, I see that JCW suspension is pretty good and I don't want to downgrade the handling with not so good coilovers, any suggestion/experiences too?

Thanks in advances and apologize for all those questions.

 

If you look at the picture I posted for reference the rear has the exact same specs and the front is 7mm (~1/4") farther in then your proposed setup.

No it won't rub anything on the inside, tons of room there. Decent chance they will rub somewhere on the outside.

 

HK_MCS

It sounds like you are still planning for these wheels.

Look at the picture, in the rear the wheel width is sticking out but the tire mounted is narrow so it tucks in under the wheel arch. Were you planning to mount tires that are narrow like this? This is common for show but not good for performance.

Sticking out 36mm in the front is very far and 48mm in the rear is almost 2 inches. Coilovers would help adjust ride height- check that the set you pick is fully adjustable.
You can also use more negative camber to tilt the tires inward a little for clearance when you do alignment or add front adjustable camber plates and rear lower adjustable control arms.

 

Thank you very much for all this answer guys, sorry I couldn't able to reply and too busy to read the forum. Would like to ask how many mm will stick out from the fender?

Do you guys know what et for an 8" wheels will flush with the fender?

Sorry for all this nooby questions.

 

It wasnt done for looks but the Pontiac Grand Prix had an option where the front tires were actually wider than the rears, it was to balance out the understeer. 255s ans 225s if I recall correctly, it was an option on the Comp-G package.

 

I think I will not run stagger for now not very practical, at the moment I don't have the original MCS wheels at the moment therefore I don't know how to how it would looks like with 8" all around et25 and how much it would stick out from the fender.

255 Front??

 

For a short while, I ran 18x8s (+45 offest) with 215/35-18 tires in my MCS that has been lowered by 1.4". Now, I run 17x7.5s (+45 offset) with 215/45-17 tires. With each of these setups, I hade no issues of rubbing anywhere. Here is a pic with the current setup.







As you can see, they are just inside the wheel arch.

 

I'd stick with the same sizes front and rear. Larger tires in the rear were originally done to get better grip for more powerful cars. The trend started back in the early days of hot rodding. And, of course, the cars were rear wheel drive. Putting larger tires on the back of a front drive car is, in my humble opinion, just plain weird.

 

On an 8" wide wheel, 30-35et is about dead flush. So et25 will stick out about5-10mm