16" versus 17" wheels ?

Seen it once (in Scotland). First, second and third impression was "How fecking stupid is that??". ;-)

Tim

You'll go further with 17" wheels. Stands to reason innit!

Nope, because the circumference is not always larger. The tyre profile is lower, this can actually make the wheel smaller.

I thought this sort of pedantry had died out? I was merely conversing with the intent of the original statement.

Because it originates in the Euro VW scene. If you haven't seen it, you haven't been looking in the right places...

Since when did any 'scene' comply with regulations anyway?

Looks like 205/55/16 (reasonable price tyres) vs 205/50/17 (how much?).

Then you need bigger tyres if you want to make full use of the 17" wheels!

Focus RS has rubber bands

17" don't seem to be a stock wheel size.

The V rated 195/55 R15 is stock on 1.8i 6J x 15".

205/50R17 103 637 2.17

Same section but bigger rim 205/50R17 is just for appearance if compared to 205/55R16. Compared to 195/65R15 it's a decent upgrade.

I think the 97mm sidewall on 215/45 would be noticeable compared to

225/45R17 is going to cost for replacements. Only 0.08% difference in rolling rad to the common stock 15inch size. If the rims don't have that size tyres on them, whine a bit, get more cash off or have them fit some.

You need at least a 7Jx17" rim, 7.5Jx17" preferable. Both will take 205,

Bigger rim reduces tyre sidewall but moves the heavy alloy rim outwards. Unless the alloy is a very expensive forging or built up from spinning that increases inertia. The inertia acts like more weight that the engine has to haul around and accelerate and brakes have to stop.

The only production Fords that I think have forged wheels are high spec Mustangs (Shelby).

Caranddriver did some tests on VW with plus sized rims. The lateral grip and most other measures of road holding increased as the wheels got bigger than stock but at excessive plus size reduced. Hit the fuel consumption and acceleration times for all plus sizes. As someone has said the larger wheel may put it in a different taxation class.

The stock 195/65R15 size was good enough for James Bond's DB5.

Just make sure they aren't the OEM "ditchfinder" tyres fitted to MX5 - P6000's.

Tell you one thing, when i had a Vectra company car in the late 90's the brakes failed on the motorway, pretty scary. Got it stopped and the brake came back ok.

Vauxhall couldnt work out what it was, in fact they had the car for ages.

Turned out to be a new tyre that was out of spec caused the ABS computer to go t*ts up on long left hand fast bends causing it to go nuts and resulted in no brakes.

I seem to remember a large recall over my car :)

Nige

Yep, that seems to be the situation, but I think I have a decent deal... :-)

On 10 x 2 spoke alloys

VED - Vehicle Excise Duty?

If that's another name for road tax it's £20 on this model. :-)

My annual mileage is only about 5k, but at 80 years old I decided to indulge myself.

My daughter may be driving it by the time tyre replacement is required... ;-)

That's what the Sales Executive told me, and they never lie...

A quick calculator-prod says there's just under 11mm difference between the two sidewalls, so 4mm in overall rim/tyre height, and about 12mm (over 2m) in circumference.

Horseshit

Not necessarily. Changing a car's wheels won't chnage the VED bracket (which stays the same no matter what you do to the car) but the same car supplied with two different sizes of wheels by the manufacturer could be in different VED brackets as low profile tyres in general have slighly higher rolling resistances.

Tim

Horseshit exists, perhaps you meant something else.

Not that I would believe a single word of anything describing itself as "green".

Plenty of other hits though:

Chris