17's front 18's rear Pros or Cons

[67Malibu]

Was wondering if there are any down sides to having 17's front and 18's rear - Any input????

[MrQuick]

Better wheel/tire size selection....I heard you had fitment problems????

[67Malibu]

they fit - just wrong rear offset to get the right look and tire size I want

[MrQuick]

oh ok, she only got half the story. What size, back space and type of wheels are you running? Also did you get your disc brakes? How far off are you...spacers can be you friend sometimes.

[teamplex65]

i have 17's and 18's on my tempest and I cant see any problems. It actually helps with the wheel openings and makes the car look a little lower even though the rear sits a little higher.

The cars in my vbgarage if you want to see them 18X9.5 and 17X7.5

[tripower]

i have 17's and 18's on my tempest and I cant see any problems. It actually helps with the wheel openings and makes the car look a little lower even though the rear sits a little higher.

The cars in my vbgarage if you want to see them 18X9.5 and 17X7.5

What did you use for BS on the rears? What sized tires are you running? Thanks.

[Drewhelm]

I had a 16/17 combo on my 69 bird, just switched to a 17/18 combo. Tires went from a 225/50/16 front and 255/45/17 rear to a 245/45/17 and 295/35/18. Car handles GREAT!

[JodysTransmissions]

teamplex65,

I checked your vBgarage pics of your car, What size tires are you using? Nice ride. How do you like the air-ride suspension?

Thanks & Regards, Jody

[Jim Nilsen]

If my memory serves me correctly Corvettes have been using the 1in. difference front to back for a long time. The difference gives any car a little bit of rake effect without it really being there if you use the right tire sizes. If you use other tire sizes it will give you a definate rake. The biggest reason to do it is to have wider tires in the rear with the same size sidewall as the fronts since narrower tires with the same size aspect ratio will have less sidewall.

With all of the newer performance cars using 18's and the number of aftermarket wheels being 17's you should be able to always get tires at a much more reasonable price than what used to be.

The cost and availabilty of 16" tires has driven most everyone to 17".It still gets me angry when the tire companies are too good to make some small runs of 16" tires from the molds they probably have stored somewhere. I remember when you could get 305 to 315's for 16" Corvette wheels. I still wonder what the Corvette owners are going to do when they go to replace the original tires on some of the years that had sizes wider than 255's

Like everything else when the time comes and enough people call screaming for them it will probably happen. Until then we will all have to upgrade to the plus size world of tires and wheels.

Jim Nilsen