lt1form

I was just at the Dynamic Motorsports website and they have a set of used wheels that they say fits BMW 3 and 5 series AND Fbodies?????????????????

What ????

BMWs = same bolt patern as our cars????????????????????

Hyperspeed97z28

Yeah, some of the BMW wheel will fit our cars, pretty weird and neat if you ask me, Some of them look REALLY GOOD too, look them up in the apperance forum, I seen a guy had some m5 rims, looked nice!

rain95z28

The bolt pattern for our cars is 5x4-3/4 inches or 120.6mm. The Pattern for some Bimmers is 5x120 mm which is only .6mm off so the wheels will fit. The thing you have to watch for is the offset or backspacing of the wheel. Some wheels are available in multiple offsets, so you have to get as close as possible to the stock offset as possible to avoid rubbing the fender well or suspension. I can't remember off the top of my head what our offset is. Go to tirerack.com and you can look it up. I tried to order some BMW wheels from either tirerack or discounttiredirect9can't remember which) a couple of years ago and the salesman wouldn't let me order them cuz I told him they were for a Camaro. I was pissed!! He said that since they were not the exact pattern for my car, they didn't want to be held liable. Stupid if you ask me, but there are plenty of wheel sites that will gladly take your money and give you what you want. Superbuytires.com and Wheelsboutiqe.com both have a lot of rims for our cars so check them out. You can search by car or by wheel brand and just look for the size you want, eg. 18x9.5/5x120 with whatever backspacing we need for F bodies. Hope this helps, I'll be ordering mine as soon as I figure out what I want.

lt1form

Sweet! Thanks guys!

pu12en12g

Yeah do a search in the appearance forum... lots of posts about this..

OldSStroker

How about equal time for a different opinion from a automotive engineer:

I don't think this is a good idea. That .65 mm difference forces the wheel either to not be centered and/or it puts a bending load on the wheel studs because the nuts don't seat properly especially if they are taper-seat rather than flat.

Wheels should be "hubcentric" or locate off the center. I doubt that BMW uses the same hub size as the F-bod. If you really had to do this, machine some adapters to go from the wheel bore to the car hubs. That asumes the BMW is larger. If the BMW nuts do not have the same thread, you should machine the wheels to take flat bottom nuts (in place of taper-seat), which requires hub-centric mounting.

Other than a vibration that you'll never get rid of if the wheel mounts offcenter, you risk either wheel or stud failure. Neither is a pretty picture.

I don't think TireRack was "stupid" at all. The folks who would try to fit mismatched wheels are often the first to sue the supplier when they crunch the car.

My $.02

dave1w41

Making an automotive engineering argument on this website is futile. Everyone on here knows that .3mm of bending on every stud is meaningless - until the wheel falls off. I mean it is just .3mm of bending over a .1mm distance from the hub surface to the backside of the stud hole in the wheel. "TINK!" what was that? BTW, no one on this site has ever seen a blueprint for that interface so they couldn't possibly comprehend how that bending moment might fatiuge the stud and cause it to snap off.

OldSStroker

LMAO here, dave. I like your attitude.

Thanks for the support.

(Back to Adv Tech, I guess)

pu12en12g

So my wheels go on perfect everytime because of that .65 mm difference ?



Too bad that you experts can't explain where all of this "extra" stress is coming from.

dave1w41

We won't have to when you are driving on the rotor.
Long story short, there is extra space around the stud to allow the wheel to fit over it but the nut and wheel have matching tapers. When you torque the wheel you bend each and every stud a little bit toward the center of the wheel (because the bolt circle diameter in the hub is larger than the pattern in the wheels). This induces a bending at the base of the stud where it enters the hub flange. It is really very simple. You are bending the wheel studs when you tighten the wheels. This compresses the material on the inside of the bend and stretches the material on the outside of the bend. The stretched material will eventually fatigue and a crack will start at the outer part of the bend and go in toward the center of the hub.
Eventually this bending will cause the stud to fatigue and break. They will probably break off right at the bottom of the thread just as the stud transitions into the splined end that retains it in the hub. You may lose them one at a time or all at once, heck - you may never lose any but you are definitely putting stress on the studs that they are ill-equipped to handle. - In stock condition they can easily handle road racing or autocross. They can also handle a great deal of over-torque and other things that they are designed to handle. What you are doing may never result in a failure but it may especially if you expose that interface to high limit loads. It greatly decreases the ability to handle loads that were designed into the original wheel/rotor/hub interface. That means that if you do decide to go autocrossing or road racing, don't do it with those wheels. The styling of those wheels isn't worth it, put them on E-bay and get some other ones that fit. I'm not flaming you, I like the wheels too but there is a reason why it isn't reccomended - it probably isn't safe.

Cory_SS

.......and to think I almost bought a set. Glad I bought some Enkei's!

OldSStroker

Good explanation, dave1w41.

Bolts and studs are designed to work in tension (pulling along the bolts axis), NOT in bending. You were right-on stressing (pun intended) the bending loads experienced with a mis-fit wheel. Even when the wheel gets high bending loads during cornering, the properly affixed wheel only loads the studs in tension.

therealmagyver

Some car wash screwed up my rims, so I'm going to be changing my rims anyway. I have a court date for Aug 20,2003. Wish me luck!

Injuneer

I always love these posts....

I guess these guys have X-ray vision and can be sure there are no cracks developing in the studs, the wheels or the nuts. Just like the people that are sure a 315/35-17 really does work "perfect" on a 17X9 rim.

Engineers are just a bunch of conservative old ladies, I guess .

OldSStroker

Becareful, young man, or I'll hit you with my Ronnie Reagan autographed purse.