hondabtec

Any benefits (such as handling) for using 16" rear and 15" front rims? Or purely cosmetic? PS, the car is built more for drag rather than tracking, pls input...

00Red_SiR

I know people have done this on RWD cars but on a FWD car?? can't say I think it would look good.. I know when I had 17's on my car and went to the drag strip I'd put my 14's on the front and leave my 17's on the back. It wasn't for show, it was to reduce the weight of the wheels on the front of my car and put grippier tires on there. Are you sure you're not confusing this with people trying to do it for looks etc??

Rodney

purely cosmetic. if you go with a wider tire in the back on a fwd car, this will adversely affect handling, as the rear tire will be too wide for the weight and you won't get the appropriate heat into it to work correctly.
personally, i run a huge front tire, and a skinny rear on my car

thisisntjared

main benefit = bigger brakes.

EDIT: sorry i didnt read first post in detail. thought this was a big rim vs small rim question.

in attempts to make ammends:
in general handling will be worse(for my tastes) with larger rims in the rear on a fwd car. i would think for drag it wont help much since you can just have the tire pressure at the maximum. however, im sorry not to knowledgable with the strip.


Modified by bleh at 11:25 PM 11/29/2004

Redline96LX

for drag, you want small wheels, and big fat sticky tires. for drag only, id reccomend sticking with the crappy brakes (its not autocross) then you can get on like 13" rims, light ones where you can fit those wide smooth drag radials. that will help so much more. yea you can get a lightweight 16", as much as a VX wheel perhaps, but big rims that are light cost a lot.

93civiccxhatch

If you run bigger wheels in the back and smaller wheels in the front, it keeps weight transfer to a minimum which is what you want on a front wheel drive. It keeps more weight on the front for more traction.

HondaCivicAddict

The point of having bigger tires is to get better traction. Why would u put bigger tires on the rear of your car when Hondas are rear front wheel drive? Unless you didn't know it was fwd.

Kamin

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by bleh &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">main benefit = bigger brakes.</TD></TR></TABLE>
rear brakes do about 15% of the braking so bigger brakes in the rear than the front is pointless.

ONE.SIX SI

I have seen this done before on a 93 hatch and a 95 EX. Both used 16s on fr and 17s on rear. Didnt look good on the sedan but the hatch looked like it had a chissel effect. It visualy seemed to be leaning forward. Very agressive and very cosmetic. Cant see any benefits coming from this.

rathabun

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ONE.SIX SI &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> I have seen this done before on a 93 hatch and a 95 EX. Both used 16s on fr and 17s on rear. Didnt look good on the sedan but the hatch looked like it had a chissel effect. It visualy seemed to be leaning forward. Very agressive and very cosmetic. Cant see any benefits coming from this. </TD></TR></TABLE><TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Kamin &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">rear brakes do about 15% of the braking so bigger brakes in the rear than the front is pointless. </TD></TR></TABLE>

i 2nd that

seppuku

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by HondaCivicAddict &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">The point of having bigger tires is to get better traction. Why would u put bigger tires on the rear of your car when Hondas are rear front wheel drive? Unless you didn't know it was fwd.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Simple...you want a skinnier, but taller rear tire. This will cause the nose of the vehicle to point down slightly, so during launch the weight of the vehicle is kept more on the power wheels...

With that said...the advantage is very minimal and driving around on a skinnier rear tire will only lead to the back whipping out on you during a turn. You'll gain a greater advantage by putting stiffer springs and shocks on the rear (hopefully height adjustable), preventing the rear springs to compress during a launch.

marshun

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by bleh &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">main benefit = bigger brakes.</TD></TR></TABLE>

wow thats genius. put bigger brakes in the rear than in the front. lol

its pretty much all for looks. even on a rwd car.

Kamin

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by marshun &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">wow thats genius. put bigger brakes in the rear than in the front. lol

its pretty much all for looks. even on a rwd car.</TD></TR></TABLE>mmm not necessiarialy, usually you can get a large width wheel for the rear in a larger diameter, like its hard to find a 16X9.5 wheel but its much easier to find a 17X9.5. not ALWAYS but sometimes its functional for RWD.

marshun

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Kamin &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">mmm not necessiarialy, usually you can get a large width wheel for the rear in a larger diameter, like its hard to find a 16X9.5 wheel but its much easier to find a 17X9.5. not ALWAYS but sometimes its functional for RWD. </TD></TR></TABLE>

how is it functional? given that a bigger rim will cause you to run lower profile tires with stiffer side walls.

but besides whats already common knowledge, whats this other benefit?

you can just about any type of results you want just by playing with tires sizes and suspension settings.

i can find 16x9.5 rims easily. you just have to know where to look.

Kamin

width not diameter is functional.

a 16x9 wheel dosent give you alot of choices and isnt that cheap eithre, you go up an inch or 2 and they become pretty reasonable not to mention ALOT more wheels come int o play

TGrant

in the front on a front wheel drive car the smaller the complete wheel and tire height the lower the gear ratio you will have

example: 15" rim with a 40 series tire will give you a lower gear ratio than a 17" rim and a 40 series tire

as to why you would put a bigger wheel on the back is pure stupidness

wrEcKed_LX

iTrader: (1)

I have seen several of the japenese race civics that run a 17x7 in the front with a 15x7 or 16x7 in the rear. Or they could run a 16x7F/15x7R. Cant remember the date but Super Street had the Cusco EK gymkhana (sp?) that was running a FF biesed wheel setup.

On another note, has anyone seen the EF civic drift car? it looks like its runnin a 13 in the rear. Drifts pretty well too believe it or not! Sorry, didnt mean to post-*****.

wrEcKed_LX

iTrader: (1)

Sorry if i misunderstood. I was looking at the staggered setup from the handling standpoint. If you have less weight on the rear of the car, it should be able to rotate easier causing more of a neutral-steer. If combined with a rear sway, and all of the other goodies Cusco Japan can afford, it would make a handling monster.

crazeejdmek9

bigger wheels on the back for rwd cars serve as to increase traction, in your case it serves no purpose at all, for us fwd owners its best to just get a wider and bigger tire in front fo traction no need for big wheels

hondabtec

Thanks for all the input, so basically is more for cosmetic...

As the car is built more for "drag"(n this is a streetcar as well of coz, but i don't race on the streets ), will the bigger 16" rear transfer more weight to the front, thus creating more traction like one of the bros pointed out, ok n for those who r worried that i might not know EK is a FWD car, i'm aware.. thanks.. period....

I'm thinking of a setup that the fronts are using semi-slicks 15/195/55 yokohama A048, the 16" rears are fitted with "normal" street tyres, any good? Again thanks for all the valuable inputs

gldndrgn14

iTrader: (1)

i think this fad started when the hondas started getting popular and people did it cause they saw other race cars do it. so they thought hey, its cool to have big wheels in the back and have donuts up front. i see no point. for fwd it should be the same size wheels and tires. its not designed for a staggered setup. for drag, you want wider tires with better traction. and for example this whole fad started with donuts up front with aftermarket wheels out back. no point. does not help any.

Rodney

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by gldndrgn14 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> for fwd it should be the same size wheels and tires. its not designed for a staggered setup </TD></TR></TABLE>

i disagree. for max performance, fwd should have a staggered setup, although with the wider wheel/tire combo in the front. our cars have 62~65% weight bias toward the front, so the front sees most of the load. not too mention, the front tires are driven. that is why on my car i run an equivalent to a 245 section width tire in the front and a 205 in the rear. even though my car is more of a track car then a drag car, the theories still apply. but, for most, an even size all around will be most efficient.

james p.

no benefits whats so ever.

there would be no benefits in drag racing because the increased grip (on the wrong set of tires) would hold you back.

on the track, probably make things even worse. it would most likely cause the car major oversteer since it would even more difficult to have that ever so little slip from the rear that helps in cornering.

it's purely cosmetic and IMHO looks retarded when you know the car is FWD.