I've got a 2000 SS with the 17x9 chrome ZR1 type wheels. I'm getting close to needing new tires, and I'm wondering if "plus sized" tires might be a way of making my tires look a little wider without having to buy new rims. Anyone have experience with these? Do they look OK?

Here's a link to the place I'm looking at..

http://www.discounttiredirect.com/

Just click on tires, and there's a link to plus sizing from there..

 

i cant find the link and i have no idea what plus size tires are

 

Yeah, post a direct link please

Plus sizing is when you want you're rim bigger, and your sidewall smaller in order to equal the stock tire height.

Going from 275/40R17 to 275/35R18 tires is plus sizing...you go from a 17 inch rim to an 18 inch rim, yet the overall diameter of the tire is the same.

This should help you

 

damn,
that's neater than hell!!

 

I could play for hours!

On the original question - if you are just wanting wider tires with the wheels you have, then you might be in luck...

I am not sure exactly what size tire you are running right now, but, you might be able to go up one size.

I am sure that some guys have pushed a 285 tire on a 9" rim, but you'll have to get a smaller sidewall so it doesn't "bubble out" as bad - maybe like a 285/35...I am suspecting that you are running 275's or maybe even lower, but you may also already be up to as wide as you can go.

 

Sorry guys, here's a direct link to the site I was talking about.

http://www.discounttiredirect.com/di...PlusSizing.jsp

Looking at that stuff for too long gives me a headache.

All I'm really trying to accomplish is wider tires with my existing 17x9 wheels.. 94BlackBowtie is right - I've got the original 275/40's on there now.. anyone gone wider on this size rim? Would ZR1 style wheels look goofy if they were "sunken in" on wider tires?

Thanks for all the replies..!

 

I'm new to this so bear with me. What if you wanted a bigger rim and a bigger tire?

 

im thinkin you could probly go to a 295 on a 9.5" rim and it would look fine. any wider and it might start to look a little goofy.

 

you mean bigger rim and wider tire ? if you mean wider and you still want to keep the same overall diameter then you just have to go with a lower profile tire. like a 35 series or even a 30 series depending on how much taller of a rim and wider of a tire you want to go. so if you have a 17" rim and 275/40 rubber and you want to upgrade to a 18"rim and say 295 rubber then you would buy 295/35/18 rubber. hopefully that makes sense.

 

I think that's where you start to have problems with the spedometer not being accurate. The whole "plus size" thing seems to solve that by changing the tire/rim size at the same time, so that the whole diameter remains the same. What I don't understand is why anyone would want to do this.. unless you like the matchbox car look..

 

I thought that the ZR1/SS rims were 17x9's.. are they 9.5" already? Is there a way I can tell by looking at them? Another stupid question for you - what does a 285 or 295 size tire translate to in inches?

Thanks for your patience...

 

"speedometer reading with non-stock tires is 29.6% too slow. when your speedo reads 60, you are actually traveling 77.7 mph"

 

285 = 11 1/4"
295 = 11 5/8"
im pretty sure they are 9.5" wide rims but i could be wrong.

 

Where did you get that?

 

The error ratio is at the bottom of the mazda tire calculator page - I think it also tells you revolutions per mile and other stuff.. if you missed the link someone posted previously here it is again. http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html you should bookmark this!

I was always under the impression that plus sizing is what all the african american folk were up to with the 22 inch rims and the 30 series tires where the overall tire diameter is larger than stock. If that's what you want than I'm going to advise against it for a number of reasons.. the most important being: it'll look like crap

That tire size calculator will let you see what different rim/tire combo's will actually look like, you can try and setup something where you'll have larger overall diameter (plus sizing) but I think you'll find that those tire sizes just don't exist - take a 295 X 50 X 17 I don't think any manufacturer produces a tire in that size.. not every tire/rim combo that you can come up with in the tire size calculator exists in reality. In general, manufactures try to make tires that will keep the same overall wheel diameter - meaning that if you jump up to a 17X9 inch rim (from the stock 16 X 8) then all the tires will have a lower aspect ratio (series number) because the rim is bigger and the tire is wider and thus you end up with less sidewall and more rim but the same overall diameter which is something like 25.56" or thereabouts.

295 is width in milimeters.. do the math and translate mm to inches and you can see how wide the tire is. EDIT: sorry, I see someone else already kindly did the math for you. Honestly, wider is not always better.. the tires are more expensive and more prone toward hydroplaning and you wont see much if any increase in traction in a straightline.. in a corner though the width probably will help more. Straightline traction comes from 1. the tire compound and 2. the height and flex of the sidewall (more sidewall is better). I'd say on a 9.5 inch rim go with a 275 or 285. Besides, any wider on that width rim and you'd risk cupping which will drastically hurt traction and tire life and is just flat out dangerous to boot.

Since I've tried explaining everything else I might as well briefly explain aspect ratio too (for you newbies). The "series" number or aspect ratio is exactly that.. it's the ratio of the height of the sidewall to the width of the tire. So, a 40 series tire would look different on a 275 wide tire as compared to a 195 wide tire. The 40 series 275 would be a lot taller (more sidewall) than the narrower 195 IF I'm not mistaken.

Sorry, I meant to make this brief and it turned into somewhat of a novel.. oh well, I'm tired.. I hope all that makes sense