So I recently purchased my New MC and I realize now, I am a complete newbie when it comes to cars, in this specific case, wheels/tires.

I got the stock 15" wheels (15 x 5.5?), with P175/65R15 tires to go along with it.. I have been looking at all different wheels from all different manufacturers, but cannot determine whether or not I would need new tires as well, when getting the new wheels. If I would need to get new tires, how would I know what tires would be a good fit for the Mini? If I wouldnt need new tires, how would I determine whether or not the specific wheel I am looking at would fit my current tire? One that I am looking at is http://www.outmotoring.com/mini-coop...-pro-race.html but I don't know which option to choose for my car. I want this wheel in 16" but have no idea what offset means or how low I would want/need it. Obviously I know its 4x100,, but I dont know what the 7.0 x 16 means. I assume naturally the 16 stands for the inches but I dont know what the 7.0 means on the 16 inch wheels, or for my 15 inch wheels, what the 5.5 stands for. I know this is probably a bunch of mumbo jumbo but I am clueless as to what to look for. Any help would be appreciated..!

Thanks in advance,

 

Hi ands welcome to the NAM, congrats on your new purchsse! 16" = wheel diameter, 7"= wheel width basically if you change the wheel diameter you are going to have to change the tires to the macthing diameter. If you buy the wheels from Outmotoring offset isn't going to be an issue. Check out this site http://www.tirerack.com/index.jsp you want to enter your vehicle info and it will give optional wheel and tire sizes specific to your vehicle, some self searching on thsi site will aslo give you plenty of useful info, good luck and have fun

 

As said, 7x16 (usually written 16x7) means the wheel dia. is 16" and rim width is 7". Another number you need to know for wheel size is the offset. My 16x7 Rota Slipstream wheels have an offset of +40mm and fit well. Outmotoring recommends 45mm.

Now for tire numbers. I'm running 205/55-16 tires on the 16x7 wheels. The 205 number is the tread width in mm. The 55 is the aspect ratio for sidewall height--the sidewall height is 55% of the tread width. The 16 is the size wheel it fits on.

Here is a page that you can plug in the wheel and tire numbers and get a visual idea of what they mean.
http://www.bigcustomwheels.com/info_specs.jsp

Your 175/65-15 tires are probably 24" dia. 16" and 17" tires on the MINI are typically 24.5" dia. That is what the 17" tires that came on my MCS were.

205 is the tread width that comes with 17" wheels on the MINI, and is a good size for 7" wide wheels. However, there are no 205 wide tires that are 24.5" dia. The choices are 205/50-16 which are usually 24.1" dia. and 205/55-16 which are 24.9" dia. On my MCS I went with 55 for the taller sidewall (more to absorb bumps), but you may want to go with 50 because it is closer to what your car came with. The larger dia. gives a slightly higher effective gearing, so better economy with constant speed driving. The smaller wheel would give a lower effective gearing, so better acceleration. The difference is only about 4%.

If you go to TireRack.com and plug in 205/50-16 tire numbers it will show you tires that are available in that size.

The tires you want depends on what you want from them. If you want summer tires with good performance, but civilized street manners, the Michelin Pilot Exalto PE2 tires are a good choice. For a more extreme performance tire, but louder road noise and harsher ride, The Dunlop Sport Z1 Star Spec is a good choice. If you decide to go for the larger 205/55-16 size, the Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 looks interesting. It would come somewhere between the PE2 and the Star Spec.

 

check this out... Tire Size Calculator
http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

pay specific attention to the line that tells you how much difference there is between the original tire size and the new one you input (what the difference in overall diameter and speed will be).

Robin, that link you gave doesn't work for me. but this one does...
http://www.bigcustomwheels.com/rt_specs.jsp
Pretty cool page, will have to add it to my bookmarks.

 

Awesome. I did look into tirerack.com but even with that had trouble figuring out what I would need. Basically if I want a 16" wheel, I would need to buy tires that are size 195/55-16? And as long as the bolt pattern is 4x100 I should be good? My one question is what does the 5.5 (on the 15's) and the 7 (on the 16's) mean other than width for the wheel. Basically where does that reflect on the size of the tire needed? Sorry for the complete wheel 101 lesson but I am good as lost..

Thanks 20Works4Me and anyone else who cares to chime in..!

 

Unfortunately it does not directly reflect on the tire size as in on a 5.5 you must use a 195/xx tire. The 16x7 that Robin mentioned has a good fit with a 205/xx tire but you could also fit a 215/xx on there and probably even 195 but the 195 would not fit really well and the 215 would might be a little on the wide side, and a 225 would be a tough fit. Many people that go to larger rims like 18, 20, 22 or larger will go with a narrower tire than recommended to make them fit inside the tire well.

So there is no exact science of tire size width to rim width.

 

check here...
http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=46

in the tire size such as 205/55-16, 205 is 205mm (millimeters) which roughly equals 8 inches. but tires are a little wider than wheels and so the 8 inch wide tire is mounted on a 7 inch wide wheel (OEM anyways). and just to confuse you more, the 55 in that in that tire size is NOT 55mm. it is an aspect ratio (the sidewall height is 55% of the tires width). the link above explains most of this.

 

Terry, it does depend what you want. Looks, all-season, performance etc. Calling Alex@TireRack would be a good place to start. Now, the 15 x 5.5 is 15" diameter and 5-1/2" wide wheel.

 

Does your car have a spare? As I recall the most basic MC wheel has a spare. If you upgrade the spare will be useless, don't forget that.

 

Call Aaron at Outmotoring.com - you will find him knowledgeable and very helpful.

 

Thanks for help weeks/months ago, it certainly answered my questions, but I have decided on a wheel, but wanted to see what the wonderfully knowledged people of NAM thought. I am looking at buying some Drag DR-34 17x7.54 wheels but I'm not sure which wheel would be better for me, 205/45-17 or 215/45-17? As you can see from the above posts, I know close to nothing about wheels, now would there be anything different about buying a wheel with a 7.5 width?

Also, I went to the local wheel, shop and they did not see a problem with the spare only having space for a 15.. They implied that it wouldnt be much of a problem to run 1 15, and 3 17s while using a spare for limited amount of time. My question, along with if what the tire shop said makes much sense, can a 17 really not fit in the space for the spare?

Not sure if I can post the wheel I want to buy since its not off of tirerack or outmotoring..

Thanks!

 

What finish are you thinking? I would think a silver or gunmetal would look best with Horizon Blue.

 

I have a thing for black rims.. Black with silver lip.. I know I have a white roof, black might clash but I think it'll look good.

 

I know you guys are out there just dying to answer my questions.. Don't be afraid to..!

 

I don't know anything about Drag DR wheels, so can't help you with that. Generally, forged is better than cast. You want to make sure the wheel is strong. Cast is usually weaker for the same weight. Lighter is good, but not to the point where it becomes weak.

205/45-17 and 215/45-17 are tire sizes, not wheel sizes. 205/45-17 is stock size for 17" wheels, but a number of people are running 215/45-17. The first number is the width in mm. The second is the aspect ratio. In this case, it would be 45% of the width, or 96.75mm. The third number is the wheel size it is meant for.

A stock 17" wheel size for a MINI would be 17x7" +40 (or is it +38) 4x100.

17 is the wheel dia. 7 is the rim width. +40 is the offset. 4x100 means it has four lug holes that are 100mm apart.

You might have fun playing with this tire size calculator on this page: http://www.bigcustomwheels.com/info_specs.jsp
It will show you what happens when you change wheel and tire sizes.

Some people do use 7.5" wide wheels, and a few use 8" wide wheels. If you want to go with 215/45-17 tires, there may be some handling advantage to a 17x7.5 wheel, but the tire will fit on a 17x7 wheel.

 

Hey thanks Robin.. Yea I meant tire for the "205/45-17 and 215/45-17", not wheel (so dumb of me)... I pretty much understand what all the numbers mean, thanks to you and others from earlier posts.. I was more so was looking for an opinion on which tire size would be better for me, since they both seem to work on the wheel i've pretty much decided upon, unless there is a significant issue with them..