I decided that after this happened at the track last year from not having enough negative camber:



I wanted to run between -2.5 and -3 degrees up front. This would look stupid with the stock wheels. So I bought some of these babies:



I bought some 225/45R15 RS3s for up front as well. The rims are 15X6.5 +30. I was going to go with the 15X7 +50, but the +50 offset threw me off...and I figured it might rub the front inner wells with 225s. I also figured that it would rub the trailing arm in the rear if I decided to go 225s out back. I think I can live with a half inch less width on the wheels to solve the rest of the issues.

The 225s fit just fine...and they're about .5'' wider over all than the stock wheels and the 205/50R15 ADVAN AD08s that I was running.




They look AMAZING in person. I snapped off some camera phone pics in the garage at night.





The setup is 225/45 up front and 205/50 out back. It's on Ground Controls and Konis with 340/360 rates. Stiffer rates out back. Car was still understeering a ton last year, so I think that the 225s up front and more front camber will solve that issue.


The car will look a lot better when it's lowered a bit more with a little more camber up front and out back. The wheels stick out of the fenders up front as they sit. The rear won't clear the fender lip...and I don't really wanna roll the fenders on this car. So negative camber use it will be!






I won't be driving it till April, but I didn't want the cold weather to affect the tires or flat spot them or whatever. So I used some spare all season tires on stock wheels to store the car.

Hopefully next year, I'll have someone with a decent camera take some pics of the car with the final camber/height settings. I think it's going to look really really good.

The disadvantage to the ENKEI RC-G4 is that since they're gravel rally wheels, they're designed for a blend of strength and light weight. They're about 18.7lbs each! heavy heavy! That's significantly more weight than my 17X9 ADVAN RG2s on my S2000!

Oh well. They look great. I didn't want to get Rotas because of....personal reasons lol. I didn't want to spend $2000+ on TE37s...because I'm kinda poor and I like to pay cash for stuff.

These wheels were right at the top of what I was willing to spend. On sale, I got them for $878 shipped/taxed. Not bad.

The advantage to rally wheels is that they're meant to hold relatively large brakes under relatively small diameter wheels. If I ever wanted to, I think I could run S2000 brakes without changing the wheels. I'll have to check next year when I get my S2000 back from the storage locker. I can test fit em and see if they'll clear the front brakes. I beleive these wheels clear Subaru WRX stock 4 piston brakes. So I would assume S2000 brakes not to be an issue.

Now I can't wait to start driving the car again...and more importantly....get it back on the track!

 

You should have put on rally tires on those. Looking great!

 

SHUBARU LOL

 

Sexy!!

 

If you're worried about understeer, adding more camber out back is just going to make the problem a lot worse.

As well, a 225 on a 6.5" wheel is going to make the car handle a bit more sloppy. Overall grip may be better, but turn-in certainly won't be.

And a +30 up front with a 225 will also probably rub on turns, especially with the mild springrates that you're running.

They look decent, but I'm not sure they are going to give you the performance you are after...especially if you have to add camber to keep them from rubbing.

 

I'll be adding mostly front camber to reduce understeer. The rear camber will only come in a touch to clear the lip. I'm confident there will be no rubbing.

Why would a 225 handle more sloppily on a 6.5'' rim?

IDK....all in all, I think this will be a pretty decent set up. I can always change spring rates as I go. I've only started to set this car up. I'm sure it'll get faster as time goes.

I'm not worried about it. Don't worry about it.

 

Because you put a tire that is made for 7.5-8.5" on a smaller rim so its going to move around a little bit/roll under cornering. Not a big deal but but it would be less sloppy on a wider rim.

 

Yes, exactly. Street tires are especially sensitive to being on a narrow rim because street tires are designed with a relatively soft sidewall. This causes a lot of deflection and thus leads to sloppy turn-in.

That 225 really needs to be on an 8" rim. You even went as far as putting a 205 out back. Good in theory, but you need bite and quick turn-in up front to get good initial rotation. Otherwise, the car wil lbe slow to turn and slow to rotate. Nothing worse than going from push to oversteer mid-corner.

 

Hmm. Well...I guess we'll see what happens next season. If I hate em, I can always sell em.

There's a pretty shitty selection of 15'' wheels in 5X114.3 lol. I know that the 6.5'' wheel isn't an optimal width for a 225mm tire. But I think that with a little more setup time, the car can still be pretty quick.

Only time can tell. Maybe I'll see you guys at the track next year.

 

lol. The only type of driving the car does is on paved dry/wet roads.

Thanks!

 

Looks good man! She'll be a beast next year with a little more tire and some more neg camber. I have so much catching up to do, i'm over a car behind.

 

Now you seen why many of us have gone back to or settled on a 15x7 rim with 205/50/15 tires. The car responds well to that size and the tire selections are plentiful.

 

Thanks broham.

Yeah. I guess if these tires don't work out, I'll go with some 205/50R15 R888s. I have a hook up on those usually.

 

Love the Enkei's...they compliment the ITR very nicely!

 

Thanks

 

That is some serious offset, but I looking forward to hearing of success/failure of tire rubbage. A few of use want the 225 RS-3 yet between the fender and the RTA, offset is key. The 30 offset would not rub the RTA even with 225, but I'm interested in seeing what level of camber it take to avoid serious rubbing ON TRACK.

I like your positive attitude.

 

The problem you have with the front tires was NOT caused by not having enough negative camber. Yeah there were some wear on the outer edge (not that bad actually), but the *chunking* you see there was caused by overheating.

For 225 tires, as others have already said, you'd want something wider than 6.5".
7" would be great for 225/50. 7.5" would be perfect for 225/45. Mounting 225/45 on 6.5" is doable, but your car would feel funny like driving on SUV tires. Not saying that it can't be fast, because I know some people did that because they're restricted by the rules.

 

Gotcha. Thanks. Well, I mean tires only last about a season. If I hate em, I'll only be stuck with them a couple months. Worse comes to worst, I can always sell that setup and buy another one.

 

15x8 with 225 45 15 rs3's for me i would never go smaller after having the 225's...can't imagine why anyone would want to

 

Care to go in detail about offset, camber, and maybe pic. What kind of issue did you have rubbing. Thanks

 

Well...here's the issue. All that happened on a relatively cold *** day. It was like in the 50s....MAYBE touching 60ish. It was at Gingerman. I know there was some stray gravel on turn 10 that might have caused some of the gashes in the tire.

The problem was all the idiotic understeer on T10. I was at a lot of steering angle and breathing off the throttle only half solved the issue. The car's a momentum car....I can't slow down too much to let it compose itself.

The LF tire was definitely overheating/giving up and I think that it would be better if all that pressure to turn wasn't on the VERY outside edge of the LF tire. Negative camber should take care of that.

Maybe I'm just spoiled by my S2000's response and willingness to transition from understeer (if any) to neutrality. The ITR pretty much does whatever I want it to....but it does so while wailing, complaining, and understeering. I have to enter turns slower than I should have to to prevent understeer?!! That's no good. It needs to get set up. THAT'S why I want the additional neg camber up front.

The problem with running lets say...2.5 to 3 degrees of neg camber up front with the stock wheels is that you look like an idiot doing it. Someone sunk your battleship.

Call it vain...but the wheels are on there because they will fill out the wheel wells. The 225 on a 6.5'' rim is NOT optimal. I already knew that going in. I'm just seeing how it all works out. That's all. If I hate it, I'll change it. No biggie.

I still think the car will be quite a bit faster and more fun to drive than it was with the stock wheels, 205s, and stock camber angles.

 

15x8 slipstreams(I couldn't care less that they are rota's they have served me well for numorous track days and there is almost nothing else in 15x8 5x114.3), they are a 40mm offset and require a 5mm spacer to clear the rear trailing arm. In the pictures you see there is a 10mm spacer which gives it a final offset of plus 30. 4 degrees of camber in the front 3 in the back! Zero rubbing issues with nothing done to the fenders except the lips rolled flat in the back!

 

the 15x7 225/50/15 is the Realtime racing ITR set up... I will be going this route as well.

 

225/50...wouldn't that be pretty tall? I wanted as short of "gearing" as possible.

 

50's are not too tall, most guys run 205/50/15s... the 225 is the width as you know... not sure how long they ran it this way but I have a speed article showing that wheel/tire set up... just thought it was interesting.

also if you want short gearing buy a final drive.. dont use improper tire size to achieve that.