Just curious, I just got 18"s for my car and they're noticably heavier than my old wheels. Probably about 25lbs each more(with the tires), the car seems slower to me with them on. Just curious how much they'd effect the performance.

 

Well the heavier weight could be slowing you down, also take a look and see if your wheel/tire combo is taller than you old setup....if it is then you just reduced your gearing and that will make the car feel slower, plus it will actually be slower in the 1/4. 25lbs is a heck of a weight differance too, I doubt its that much unless you got really crappy wheels. Also your speedometer is now off.........

 

25 lbs really isnt much. Example: Stock wheels are around 18 pounds each. My 17"x9.5" konigs are about 23 pounds each. That's 20 pounds. Each tire is about 3 pounds heavier then stock too, so another 12 pounds.

32 extra pounds for different wheels. Plus that weight is moved farther out from center which effects your polar moment.

Switching from my wheels to stock netted a consistent .15 seconds and 1.5 mph at the track. Those are my results, and yours may vary. Just sharing my experience

 

I'm glad I'm in the process of putting my 15" centerline Telstars on. Extremely light and will give me better torque.

 

I lost 3/10 going from 16" to 18"s plus I spin like a basterd

 

18s and above are bad for the 1/4 but good for top speed. 15s or 16s are the ideal wheel size for the 1/4 keep that in mind. I had 17s on my old car and they spun pretty bad drag racing.

 

I think he meant the wheels/tires would weight 25lbs more than teh salad shooters/tires. My telstars weighed 31lbs up front with tires and 40 on back with 26x11.50x15 et streets.

 

50 lbs inside the car say in the back seats is a lot different than 50 lbs added to the drivetrain. Rotational mass is not your friend when it comes to drag racing and it eats up power which is why you feel the car is a bit slower. To add insult to injury... a stiffer sidewall also creates a traction problem because you need a certain amount of sidewall flex to grab the pavement.