Yes you. All of you NAM-folks in fact- seeing how everytime I ask for info I get all I'm looking for. Oh, and I apologize for this longer post in advance, haha.

So I'm still running on my winter wheels. Yes I know it'll be 70 degrees this weekend in NJ (awesome!) and the wheels are long overdue to come off.

Only problem is that my other set of wheels are the OEM S-lites with RFs on 'em. They're white, but aren't in the greatest of shape, and just aren't really what I want on the car anyways. I looked around and spotted these:


Team Dynamics Pro Race 1. I'm going for a solid combination of handling and looks. I was thinking I'd go for 17's, and 215/45/17 tires. Although I'm not totally sure, I've never bought aftermarket wheels before and don't really know my way around. Although I've been browsing the threads here for over an hour to at least sound somewhat knowledgable...

So here's my question- Are these good wheels for me to buy? Like I said, my main concern is to have a good balance between handling and looks. I'm the sort of guy who doesn't mind a harsher ride to make it happen. Also, I'm hoping not to break the bank on this purchase.

Could this be done for about $1k for tires and those wheels?

Any advice or links or anything would be appreciated. Woo hoo!

 

if you have s-lites then these in 17s would be no different in terms of ride characteristics... i upgraded to 17s long time ago from stock x-lites and never really felt much difference in ride, as for handling i didn't really feel much difference either, there's a bit more weight on the steering wheel with 17s but not significant

the TDR pro race 1 are a great wheel, lots and lots of people here on NAM run them and i have more than a few local members run the same wheels.. very strong and relatively light weight for a cast wheel, they are also relatively inexpensive despite being somewhat of a reputable brand

as long as you don't go hitting curbs at 50 they will last

last note, if you plan to run white wheels ill suggest some ceramic pads that would cut down the dust on the wheels, stock brake pads are... good, but very very dusty, your wheels in white would be coated with a thick layer of brake dust very quickily, least with ceramic pads the dust is a light grey color

also, handling is a very subjective matter, what i can tell you is that tires does alot of the handling feel for ya, a good grippy tire will feel very different to one that's designed for high mileage (my Azenis for example, lasted barely 10k and its nearly shot, but they are still very grippy)

hope this helped

 

There are a lot of People running with those wheels all over the USA

I'm runing with 215/45/17 tires with these wheels

 

Niceee. So 215/45/17 looks pretty sharp. Hmm... just out of curiosity- if I wanted something with a thinner sidewall, what sort of sizes would I be looking at? 215/40? I like how your car looks (and btw, is that Purple Haze?? looks sick) with your setup, but looks-wise for what I'm going for, I feel like a shorter sidewall couldn't hurt.

True... I have little knowledge on tires and what to expect when it comes to grip vs wear and etc. I was thinking of getting the Falken FK452's, but that's just from lots of info from threads here and online window shopping.

Is there a better bang-for-the-buck type of summer performance tire? Noise is definitely the lowest priority for me, while handling and looks are the highest.

Any recommendations for where to buy the TD wheels? Ideally I'd like to buy them with the tires too, and have them mounted and balanced if possible. I spotted them on OutMotoring, and also on customwheelsdirect.com, who wanted $1347 for the TD's and the Falken's, before shipping.

Aye cap'n, it did!

 

215/40-17 is acceptable for majority of tires, keep in mind there's a few tires with load rating being lower than stock (the mini requires 84 load rating), and some 215/40-17 would be around 83, i'd stay away from anything below 84 especially if you load up the car every now and then

also, 215/40-17 is a teensy bit smaller than stock, significant enough to make a slight speedometer difference (i believe it'd rotate faster, and thus your speedometer will read a speed faster than actual speed, according to miata.net's tire calculator, at 60mph speedometer speed, you will be going at about 58 mph instead)

im also one of those looking at 452... i currently have azenis RT615 and so far they are very grippy, can't do wet at all and lasted me about 10,000 miles so far and im just touching the wear bars, but at ambient temperature at least they have ALOT of grip

 

I've got the 17" white Team Dynamics Pro Racing wheels- one of the lightest wheels you can get. They do get dirty pretty quickly, but boy, do they look great when they're cleaned up. You can check them at my gallery page. I put Michelin Pilot Exalto PE2's on them, an extremely light tire, and saved double digit poundage on each corner. Losing unsprung weight is one of the best ways to enhance the car's handling characteristics.

 

Thanks Yes Purplehaze is Merlin's color

 

I like your wheels, what brand are they?

retroom

 

Thanks,
They are made by Speedy model are "Tremor" 17x7

 

i just put on team dynamics white wheels on my car. Love them. Swapped out the OEM pads for HP ceramics and what a difference. Love the new set up and dust has not been an issue. Before mounting the wheels use wheelarmour. it helps with simply being able to spray and wipe the little dust the HPs kick out. Not only they produce significantly less dust but the color of the dust is also lighter.