I know just about everything about a car that you learn when your car breaks down, everything else, is out the window. I just bought a 89 Pontiac Firebird that im slowly re-upohlstering, and i want to lift with bigger tires but i need a veteran of the Formula style car possibly in this area to help me out, give pointers and suggestions, so i dont f-up my lovely new toy. Ive always loved cars, time to learn something about them.

 

Just an idea, but lifting with bigger tires is not the popular thing to do anymore, and I also think it doesn't look that good.

Lowering it with bigger wheels (17s or so) would look amazing.

Either way you choose, good luck.

 

Im not a big fan of lowering cars. Too many of my neighbors around here lower their trucks and i cant stand it. Im almost 6 foot tall. I dont want to have to get on my knees to get into my car sadly. I prefer just a little height, and wider tires that stick out past the fender and body like the style thats popular on Nissans.

 

ok.. so we are trying to help you by saying "DONT DO THAT!"
You dont even have to lower the car to clean up the wheel well gap.
Tires that stick out pass the wheel well look very (pardon the term) ghetto.

My personal rule of thumb: You want the narrowest tire you can get traction with. For some, thats a 315 for others its a 245. If I can hook out of the hole with a 245, yay!, no need for 275's or bigger.

So all that being said... what are you going to do with your 89? Are you wanting to mod it? Race it? Do you have any set goals? You hitting local tracks? You want to just clean it up and go to shows? Tell us that and we can help steer you in the right direction.

 

I like the ghetto look, strangely enough and i dont like to follow current trends.

As for what im going to do with it, im definetly not going to show it, i dont have enough money as a college student to truely play with it, nor do i want to invest too much money into it if its going to start failing on me after 250,000 miles ( might not even do that if i keep up with it ). I just want a nice car im proud of that i put my money into to drive around.

 

an 89 T/A might not be your best bet for "ghettoing" out..

You will have an easier time finding performance parts cheaply than you will finding tastless parts.. And if you would like to ever resell it, odds are you can sell a well kept car closer to original than you would a bastardized car.