Why have wheels become so big!

[Gunk]

I can't understand over the last few years how manufacturers are now putting totally inappropriate wheels on mass produced family cars.

My E91 BMW has reasonably modest 17" wheels with a 45 profile tyre and with run flats, these crash over every pothole and the ride even with standard suspension is only just passable.

The Audi A5 Black Edition is offered as standard with 19” wheels with 255/35 R19 tyres, with sports suspension you might as well have no suspension at all!

What has happened? are buyers no longer interested in ride comfort, over the last 10 years ironically the condition of our roads have got worse but wheels have become larger. tyres have got wider and the profiles lower.

[Beyond Rational]

I think it is to hide the mass and slab sided nature of modern, safety reg based designs.

It is a real shame, it is such an easy way to ruin the ride and to make it impossible to fit a decent spare tyre.

[irf]

think its demand from buyers tbh. cars are also a lot bigger so need them to look proportionally right.

i can remember when i was younger thinking an E30 bmw looked so good with some slightly deeper dished 15" alloys and also thinking that 17s on the same car were massive!

i also remember thinking why don't manufacturers put bigger wheels on certain cars as the wheels looked lost in the arches. the balance seems to have gone too far the other way.

[BlueMR2]

To fill the enormous arches now a mondeo is almost as long as a old 7 series etc.

As well as to make more money for tyre makers.

[briSk]

Beyond Rational said:

I think it is to hide the mass and slab sided nature of modern, safety reg based designs.

It is a real shame, it is such an easy way to ruin the ride and to make it impossible to fit a decent spare tyre.

yes agreed. end of thread!

that and the 42" telly school of thought.

my tit of a brother in law to be. or second order BiL i don;t know what he'd nbe.. anyway had a vectra elite diseasel. it wasn;t a 1.9 fiat one so was either the wky isuzu 1.7 or the 2.2 anchor but anyway..this thing has 19"s with something like 235 section tyres.

barking.

[Gunk]

irf said:

I can remember when i was younger thinking an E30 bmw looked so good with some slightly deeper dished 15" alloys and also thinking that 17s on the same car were massive!.

I have an Audi 80 Cabriolet with 15" Wheels with 60 profile tyres and although it's not a particularly dynamic car, the ride is superb and it glides over pot holes.

[Tonberry]

An Insignia pulled into the car wash behind me the other day and the first thing I noticed was the wheels.

Bloody great big multi spoke things. Didn't inspect the tyres but they must have been a good 19 inches.

Conti Contact 3's aswell. I bet there won't be many owners replacing them with those come tyre purchasing time.

[Beefmeister]

Check this out:



That's a new Focus on 16" wheels, and it look ridiculously under-tyred.

16" used to be huge!

It's simply down to the fact that cars have got much, much bigger than they used to be, plus as has been mentioned design that relies on big wheels to hold it all together.

[thinfourth2]

tinfoil hat

Its a conspiracy by chiropractors

/tinfoil hat

[kik1.6se]

The other consideration is that brake disks are becoming larger, so larger wheels are requied, but it does seem to be mainly due to styling.

It is a shame as there is less and less choice of 13" tyres now. I would fancy trying either the Toyo R1r's or Yoko Prada tyres on my Westfield, but I'm pretty sure both are 15" minimum.

Kirk

[Beyond Rational]

I don't think I've ever seen brake discs on the mediocre types of cars that we are talking about requiring the size of wheels we are now seeing. The connection between big wheels and high performance cars can not be denied though, so it is also a cheap way of adding sporting pretensions, ironically at the expense of the driving experience.

[Zod]

Without big brake disks, they look ridiculous. You even see them on small hatches with tiny rear drum brakes.

[SteveS Cup]

I think they've grown in proportion to the body styling of cars.

I mean 20's on the new RS Focus don't look out of place. 18's on my mates old mk1 focus looked huge!

17's on a Zetec S mk5 fiesta looks silly but the ST comes with 17's as standard and looks right.

[jamesson]

I remember parking my 1994 3 Series in front of my father-in-law's 2009 3 Series. Mine is on 15" wheels, which are proportionally spot on. His was on 16" wheels which looked too small.

The difference in door height (up to the glass) and roof height was clear to see (ie the newer car was bigger) and this was what led to the wheels looking too small on the newer car.

[Gunk]

SteveS Cup said:

I think they've grown in proportion to the body styling of cars.

I sort of agree, but for instance the 2004 MkV Golf GT 140 had 16" wheels as standard, the new Mk VI GT 140 now has 17's as standard, virtually the same car, same size wheel arches, it is just driven by fashion.

I drove an E92 335i on 19's with sports suspension last year and it was awful, the ride was rock hard, it tramlined and you felt every single ripple in the road.

[Urban Sports]

briSk said:

that and the 42" telly school of thought.

Only 42"

[davepoth]

The designers have done sketches with low profile tyres pretty much since they were developed. So then the concept car builders are pressured to put bigger wheels on the concepts, and then the production engineers are pressured to put bigger wheels on too.

I always attempt to get a car specced with the highest profile tyre available, as it makes the ride much more compliant, and the handling more benign.

[danger mouse]

coz they is lookin' sick innt.

/topic

[blueg33]

I remember reading somewhere that for a car to look right the wheel/tyre combination needs to be at least one third of the height of the car.

A have an A6 with the 19 inch wheels and tyres the op refers to and IMO it looks much better than the same car on 16 or 17 inch rims. To get the same height of wheel/tyre you end up with a high sidewall which makes the handling feel worse.

Ride is firm but not as crashy as you may think, and I prefer it that way to soft and wallowy because it keeps food inside the kids rather than being chucked up.

Probably the biggest issue I have is that the huge wheels are tyres are heavy if you are changing them yourself especially with wheel bolts rather than studs and nuts.

The A6 has a full size spare and the boot space is still more than ample.

So I say, if it looks right and if you like the way it rides and handles then it is right (for you at least)

[shambolic]

My Z4 is on 19"s 35mm at front and 30mm at the rear. Ride isnae too bad but need to have reflexes ofa fighter pilot to dodge potholes!