Wheels & Tires

 You know one of  the first things you can do for your ride's look and get it noticed real quick is to bolt a set of great looking wheels & tires. And of course a great set of rims is the biggest part of that. It can give your car or truck a hot rod look very quickly even if you haven't modified your vehicle that much.

 

While you would buy custom rims to attract attention,there are some practical considerations to bare in mind.

Aluminum wheels may be lighter and take away some of the un-wanted weight of stock steel rims and help with the handling of your car or truck however the increased size of the custom wheels may actually weigh more than stock wheels especially if they are large diameter like 20 inches or more. I can tell you from personal experience that it can be confusing as to which style and size you may be interested in. The headache almost turned me off the wheels altogether! Have a look at other vehicles that have custom rims and tires or even in magazines with pictures that have caught your eye. It may go a long way to helping you decide what application is right for you. Keeping in mind the investment,you will want to be happy with your wheels for a long time.

Another consideration is clearance. You'll want to make sure that your wheel tubs will have enough room for the new tires. Nothing is a bigger annoyance than having your new rubber chewed up by inner fender wells.

Do you plan on installing a lowering kit like air bags in the future?AIR LIFT 58616 Dominator D2600 Bellow Air Bag is a great way to go by the way. If you decide to go with a previously used set of wheels,then you may want to ask what vehicle they came off of,if the car or truck was modified in anyway, if it was lowered or even if it had a body kit installed.

A little planning is always in order when you want to make any changes what-so-ever to your ride,especially is it has anything to do with how your vehicle plants it's power to the ground. If you just want to get the most bang for your buck power wise then you can simple choose a wheels assembly that  fits your ride that way it is now. Remember what I said earlier about the possibility of future modifications to the stance of your ride. Lowered spindles,springs,body kits and air bags will all have an impact on your selection and handling characteristics.

Let's have a look at wheel offset,

The measurement of a wheel is just the start of what is needed in choosing what wheel combination would work best on your vehicle. Let's have a look at where the flat machined section of the rim comes into play. Now, if that machined section is in the center of the rim then there is now offset. If it is closer to the front (outside) or back (inside) of the rim then there is an offset to a certain degree or another. Making sure that the offset clears the brake calipers is kinda important when installing custom wheels.Offset can be measured very simply by using a ruler and a tape measure. Just plane the ruler across the back side of the rim and measure down to the machined surface where the rim would mate with the rotor or drum and you have your offset. This measurement is also called backspacing. If the rim is 7 inches and the measurement to the mating surface is 3.5b inches then there isn't an offset,if it's 4.5 inches then there is a 1 inch offset. Or you could simple contact the manufacturer or the specific rim,they will should have all the details for your particular application on hand. 

Selecting Your Gears

Ready for your daily math lesson? There is a lot more to calculating your car or trucks speed than just the speedometers gears or the parameters set up in your vehicles ECM. Your gear ratio is important when it comes to knowing how fats you actually are going. Wheel size has a direct impact on how fast your car or truck is going down the road. Tire size,rear end gearing and final drive ratios are all factored into the calculations of your actual speed. A little math will save your wallet a few bucks when you get pulled over by the 5-O

What I had to figure out was if I was traveling at 65 mph what would my engine speed be.

My tires are 29 inches,my final drive ratio is .7 and my rear end gears are 3.40. I got in touch with a buddy of mine that builds trannys for hot rods and he told me that the equation looks something like this.

65(traveling speed) x 3.40 (rear end gears)x .7 (final drive ratio) x 336 (no idea why they use this number but,it's law) divided by 29 (wheel size). So with the wheels I currently have on my truck,my rpm would be 1762 @ 65 mph.

Options with newer vehicles that have speed sensors instead of speedometer gears are the power programmers that you can adjust your programming to accommodate your tires size.

Rolling Radius

I'm not going to go into this topic too much as there generally is a sticker somewhere on the tire indicating what the rolling radius is. and I mentioned above what you need to do to figure out how fast you will be going. However you may want to think about the stopping power of your vehicle when you install custom wheels. You will be giving the wheels more leverage when you go to stop. Not a good thing. You will want to have a look at upgrading your braking ability.

 

There will be more coming of the topic as soon as I get some more research done.