like the title says just wondering what more people prefer 15s or 16s

 

I prefer 16's.

 

Depends on the car

 

i got a 97 civic coupe, i wanna go lower and tuck some tire

 

Get whatever you want. But if you want to lower your car, the way to do it is with the suspension, while keeping the tires about the same outer diameter regardless of what wheel diameter you have. On your car, that means 195/55-15 or 205/50-15 on 15" wheels, 205/45-16 or 215/45-16 on 16" wheels.

 

Personally, I like 15 on hatches, 16's on coupes/sedans.

 

thanks, thats the perfect post im lookin for

 

i agree, also depends on the wheel imo too..for me i rock 15s

 

It seems that most people in the Prelude community roll with 16s. I plan on staying with 15s. I'm not sure why, but smaller (not too small, but small) wheels look good on Hondas in my opinion. A big trend for cars nowadays is large wheels; look at the new VW GTI. It looks great with its big Denvers, but I don't think an 80's/90's Honda would ever look that good with wheels that large. Nor would a GTI look that good with wheels as small as we roll.

What are the benefits of having 15s over 16s, or vice versa? How is tire selection, is it pretty fair between the two, or are there more for 16s?

 

Keep in mind that cars were designed to have the stock size tires. The speed sensors that speedometer and odometer, and the size of the wheel wells, are based on those sizes. You can get different size wheels and/or tires, but as a general rule, you still want to get a tire size that has the same outer diameter, to avoid rubbing and to keep the gauges accurate. Since Preludes and Accords came from the factory with larger diameter tire sizes than Civics and Integras from the same era, they usually use larger tire sizes, and can have more tires available for larger diameter wheels than for those Civics and Integras. The same thing is true of newer cars like the GTI you mention; it uses larger outer diameter tires (and has larger wheel wells) so you're going to find more tires available in larger diameter wheels.

There are two main differences. One is looks, which are in the eye of the beholder. The other is tire availability.

Sure, there are other differences, such as handling being better with the larger diameter wheels and their smaller sidewalls, and ride comfort being better with the smaller diameter wheels and their taller sidewalls, but those differences are relatively minor.

It depends on the type of tire. For Integras and '97-00 Civics, there are a lot of summer and all-season tire choices in both diameters (205/50-15, 195/55-15, 205/45-16, 215/45-16); there are a lot more choices of winter tires and R compound track tires in 15" sizes than in 16" sizes. For Preludes, it depends on the year; recent Preludes came from the factory with 16" wheels and 205/50-16 tires.

 

Thanks for the in depth response. I'm familiar with the speed and odometer being based on wheel diameter, how about the ABS sensors where applicable? Not that I'm planning to exceed the size of my stock of my wheel and tire radius, I'd just like to know for informational purposes. Thanks.

 

I have a DC2 Teg slammed, i prefer 16's but 15's are do-able also.

 

ABS activates when one tire slips more than the others, and has nothing to do with what size tires or wheels you're using.