I was wondering if anyone has tried running staggered front tires, as in wider front tires than in the rear.

I know that the J's Racing Fit GT run 225's up front and 195's in the rear, but that car has a massive K24A in the front and a completely stripped interior.

So I was wondering if there's anyone that still uses there car as a daily driver and has staggered front tires, and if anyone does how are the handling impressions with the staggered tires?

 

For a daily, it wont look good. Itll look like you got a deal on used tires and slapped them on. Not caring what size they were.

 

I guess I should've said what sizes i was thinking of.

I was thinking to start off with 205/50R15 in the front on 15x7 +43 offset wheels and 195/50R15 in the rear on 15x7 +38 offset wheels.

And then if I like how the staggered fitment feels maybe try 185/55R15 in the rear on 15x6.5 +33 offset wheels.

That way atleast from the side profile it'd look like the tires are the same size.

 

i doubt you're going to get much benefit from just 10mm tire width difference.
contact patch will only increase a little bit.

you're better bet is to use the same size tires and same tires and play
with the psi.

 

195/50's and 205/50's look pretty different. Your car will sit really odd.
Even if the tires are the same.

If youre going to do a staggered fitment, the right way is wider on the rear, even if the car is FWD.

You wont notice a big difference in that offset either way. However, it will end up looking great. +43 up front and the +38 in the rear on a 15x7in wheels. Run the 195/50's all around.
Itll have a nice stance, hoping that youll be going coilovers to give it a nice leveled stance.

If you want a REAL staggered fitment youre going to need some real sized wheels. 15x7's and 15x8, 8.5, 9's.
The rear of the Fit has a pretty open wheel well. If the rims arent wide it looks goofy. I know first hand.

Thats looks wise IMO.

If you want handling, +40 to +45mm does damn good on these cars. Just run 215's or 225's all around.

 

One of the reasons why I was thinking 195's in the rear is cuz right now my front end is a lot lower than the rear, quite a bit lower actually, I have lowering springs installed on the car and the front sits almost an inch lower than the rear, I have coilovers, but i can't install them for probably close to a year (looong story).

So i figured the 195's might level out the car a bit.

Also what size wheels were you saying i should run 215's or 225's on, cuz i want to stick with 15's and most 15's only come as wide as 7 inches, unless you don't care how much your wheels weigh.

 

well i don't think my car really needs too much, depending on the corner and the slope sometimes the car understeers and sometimes it oversteers, I really just want to get rid of the understeering.

 

Right now, Im running the same springs as you. Only mine are v1's. I cut 2 coils off mine in the rear. I think mine sat higher in the rear than yours did. Thats why the v2's came out.

Jap 07 Fit has the v2's and yes, those are LOW up front. WAY lower than mine.
The only way to level it out would be hackin some coils off the rear springs. Running a smaller tire in the rear will give more wheel gap since youre sticking with 15's.

My 2nd set of wheels are 15x6.5in +42/43mm offset. 215/50/15's
Im running negative camber up front also from camber bolts. My car handles like MAD on those wheels. I also have a T1R lower arm bar, and a Progress rear sway. Still though.

225/50/15's were on GSR Fat5's. 15x6in +45mm offset.
Handling seemed pretty good. This was back when I didnt have the negetive front camber. That made a world of a difference. I only did it for my old wheels.

As you said, I dont really care about wheel weight. If you care about weight, then stick with 215/50/15's.

And if youre just looking to get rid of understeer, camber bolts dude.
I didnt get a print out on what my camber is up front, but so far its not enough to cause inner tire wear. But its enough that you can see when comparing it to the fender.

 

i see. there's a couple of ways to do that...

use a progress rear swaybar.
get stickier tires in the same size and try it out.
use a more aggressive front offset vs rear offset.

using wider rear tires on a FF car is kinda ricy imho. i can
understand using wider tires on the front for better traction.

i keep running into issues where the inner tire looses grip
during a turn. and im using junk ziex912's, no rear
swaybar. just enduratechs and +40mm 15x7 wheels.

i'd like to get a bigger front swaybar in there, or higher
spring rate on the front. lol

 

What brand and model 215/50R15's are you running?

And I don't really understand what camber bolts are? Where can you buy them? How easy are they to adjust the front camber?

Also are you rubbing at all with the 215's?

 

As far as i know the only way to completely get rid of inner tire spin during turning is with an LSD, everything else helps, but an LSD is the only way to completely fix that.

 

Kumho 711's. But theyre discontinued now. They look a little chunky but they ARE wide.
Ingalls and SPC makes them. I got mine off ebay.

Yes, they will fit even though the Fit isnt listed.
Club RSX.com: SPC Front Camber Kit (Pair)

You remove the top bolt, install the new bolt and thats it. Take it to get an alignment right after. Better yet, have them installed them if you like?
With any camber adjustments on the Fit, tow needs to be adjusted also. So a 2 wheel align needs to be done.

Im really not sure how much the bolts can do for the Fits. As I said, I never got a print out. My guess, I have around -1 degree to -1.5 degree.

Without the camber bolts my 215's rubbed a tad up front. I did the fender lining mod and it got rid of most of it. The rears only rubbed on big bumps so I lived with it.

 

yep. each time the car does that it reminds me of the open diff.
kinda embarrassing, but oh well. not willing to spend more money
on the car right now other than for little cosmetic things.

it runs good enough for me for wat i bought it for.

 

Hahaha! The Fit spinning.

 

First, staggered is not wider from tires than rear. Staggered is weight/ride height difference across the corners.

That said we have put wider front tires on many FWD, not just our Fit, and it works well. The secret is to have the wider front tires slightly smaller diameter than the rear. In our Fit we used 225/35x17 fronts (23.2") and 205/40x17's rears (23.45"). It is faster.
No, don't even ask where we got 225/35x17's.

 

I don't mean for this to sound weird but who's "we"? sorry but your sig doesn't say anything about you so when you say "we have put wider front tires on many FWD" it's hard for me to tell if you're talking about many "grocery getters" or race cars.

And when you say put slightly smaller diameter fronts, with the same size tires all around is your Fit fairly level? Cuz my car is quite a bit lower in the front.

also what kind of suspension setup are you running?

 

'We' are a 50 year old shop that specializes in A/X and SCCA/IMSA/NASA/NASCAR competition cars.Our customer's FWD cars, with wider front tread than rear, run faster with slight forward rake, not only for aerodynamics but to decrease the drag from wider tires on the front. It it also an aid to increasing oversteer which FWD desperately need. The wider front tires last longer as well as cornering better. As for 'lower we're talking a quarter-inch on diameter (i/8" on ride height).
A warning to A/Xers: some regs require equal size tires all around. You can take advantage of using the same size tires but with treads shaved to get the desired results. As well as choosing brands and service spec.
We also have put wider front tires on many, many grocery getters who just wanted better handling on the street. Yeah thats involved different brands, kinds (M&S compared to R1's for example), although no changes across the axle for street use. Or most competition.
As for setups... lord help us, too wild to count.
That help ? I'm sure many shops across the country can attest to the same. cheers.
And no we do not seek more customers. Advice is free though.

 

=) Ok I have another question, I had come to a conclusion that I was going to run 205/50R15 on 15x7 +43 wheels on the front and then 185/55R15 on 15x6.5 +35 wheels on the back so that i have wider tires on the front while still having the side profile of the car look the same, although recently I realized that if I ran this set up that eventhough I'd have wider front tires, I'd also have a wider rear track compared to the front with the wider offset rear wheels, and so I was wondering if I ran that set up having wider rear wheels would that defeat the purpose of having wider front tires or should I run the same offset wheels all around or possibly even wider offset wheels in the front?

 

wider in the rear for FWD???? = SUPER RICER
do u like fake inter-coolers with fake BOV's too?


wider rear tires on a FWD car will make u look retarded in the eyes of everybody who knows the difference between FWD and RWD

just my 2 cents

 

um....Not ricer @ all. This is actually very popular among tuners now. Most VIP Styled cars FWD RWD or AWD do this.

My friends xB with staggered wheels 17x8 in the front and 17x9.5 in the rear.