ok i am ordering the OTG shims for th e rear of my 06 xB, or at least i think i am. The wheels i am getting come in 35/40/50 offsets. What i was wondering is what would be the best thing to do for front to rear wheel?? Get an offset of 35 front and rear and the shims or go for the 35 front and 50 rear and exclude the shims?? i plan on running 18X8 rims with a 225/40-18 or 205/40-18 but i don't know for sure yet. I am not planning on lowering the car at all and want the most tire for ride and fill. What are you suggestions??

 

You do know the lower the offset the further away it goes from the center of the car?

With that said. Go 35 offset all around and add the OTG's in the rear too.

 

is it further from the center to the outside of the wheel or the inside of the wheel? so basically will the 35 or 50 give me a deeper or bigger lip??

 

if youre not gonna drop it, you could proooobably go with a thicker tire than the 40 series.

the OTG shim size is on the site.... it says like 9.5 mms. so if you order the 35mm offset wheel, youll end up having about a 25mm offset wheel.... which will push the wheel out more. making sense?

 

35mm will have a bigger lip then the 50mm depending on the wheels specs. Not all wheels will have a deeper lip when the offset is lowered. It depends on the design of the wheel.

 

wow that would be great if i could go with like a 45 or 50 series tire. Guess i could ask the tire shop to mount one and check for clearance. i am still undecided on wheels though. Tonight i bought an import car magazine and saw some 5zigen wheels that are nice but i don't know if they come in a 4 on 100 bolt pattern.

ok they only come in a 20" and 5 bolt pattern

 

205 tires are too narrow to put on a 8" wide rim, so the 225s would be better purely from a tire fitment point of view. But 40 on an 18 is going to give you a tire that is too tall by a good 5% or more, so you're going to have to be very careful of rubbing issues. See if a 35 profile is available. 35 is next to no sidewall, you might as well just spray a layer of rubber on your rim to drive on

The 8" will stick out further than a 7 or 7.5", particularly with the taller 40 tire, so based on what I've read in the forum you may well be looking at some fender rubbing issues. You may want to see if there's a 7.0 or 7.5" version of the wheel available.

To consider if the tires will clear the inside stuff (strut, suspension arm, etc) we can just do some math. Stock rim is 5.5", so an 8.0" rim will be 2.5" wider, or 1.25" (32mm) each side. That means the inner clearance will reduce by 32mm. I measured my xA the other day after installing OTG hub spacers, and there's 1.5" (38mm) clearance from the stock rim to stuff it would hit both front and rear. The stock wheel has a +38mm offset. So inner clearance of a new rim would be: 38mm (clearance) - 32mm (wider rim) + 38mm (stock offset) - x (new offset).

+35mm offset gives 9mm inner clearance (plenty)
+40mm offset gives 4mm clearance (almost too close for comfort)
+50mm offset gives -6mm clearance (oops! won't fit at all).

So, obviously that eliminates the +50mm offset wheel from your equations.

I'd probably recommend the +40 if you go for the 40 profile tire (but are my measurements accurate to within 4mm - ie: do you want to risk not clearing the inside?), or the +35 if you can find a 35 profile (35 profile to maintain a nearer to stock diameter would be a best bet for avoiding rubbing).

 

215/45/17 on 7.5's w/45offset, OTG 10mm shims and 5mm spacers (rear), no rubbing.

 

40mm offset with OTG's

 

damn those look good. i am still undecided about which wheels to get!! DAMN I hate having so many choices

 

18x8 +35 all around will fit fine. Even with the 10mm OTG shims in the rear it will be a conservative fitment and you shouldn't have any problems.