Wheels and Tires
by , 10-07-2016 at 08:07 AM (3631 Views)
For my build I wanted to have better performance and decided on the 17" rim. Plus in NJ, to pass inspection you need 17" rims, their test is the frame must be off the ground if all tires were flat and just sitting on the rim.
At first I was thinking of a custom CCW rims, but finally decided to go with the traditional route and called Richard at North Racecars as he is the resident expert on wheels and tires for these cars. For what its worth the wheels that came with my kit (FFR promotional) did not fit my setup and hit the brake calipers, wrong offset, so they were quickly sold to another forum member.
The go to tire was the Kumho Ecsta, however, they seem to be hard to come by these days. I ended up deciding on the Nitto tire and liked the NT5, There was a good sale running on Discount Tire and picked up the following:
Front: 255/40/17
Rear: 315/35/17
Ideally, I should have had the front being 245/45 as the 255/40 are a little smaller in diameter compared to the rears. May give the car a nice rake, but won't fill the wheel well as much. Plus the 245 would fit in the wheel well better. Some go with the 275's and they seem to stick out a little from the fender.
Santa arrives again:
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Test Fit and they are perfect:
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Now that I have my new shiny rims and tires, where do I get them mounted. I recently went to a Mavis shop near me to get some tires remounted and balanced. Watching them work on a Porsche, the guy had the rim on edge and working on another tire. The rim starts to roll out of the shop and just before leaving he building the manager runs over and grabs it. So it won't be them. I mention this to my neighbor who is an avid car guy and his future son in law works at a Mercedes dealer in the parts dept. Well before you know it they are sending their parts truck to pick up by wheels and tires. I figured if they can work on super expensive cars they can work on mine. As the work is getting done they send me updates. The car that got new shoes before mine was an AMG GTS with 515HP and cost approx. $150k
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The guys and the equipment:
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The finished product:
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$60 worth of beer and pizza and a big smile on my face.





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