My car has 18 inch wheels with staggered fitment tires. 245/45 on front and 255/45 on the rear. Rear rims are 9" wide and fronts are 8" wide.

Can I run the same size tires (either 245 or 255 on both front and rear rims without any problems?

Thanks
Paul

 

You probably could...I would opt for the 255s front and back.

The question is...why? It won't help your rotation options, because you can never bring those wider wheels to the front. So if you're going to keep a staggered fitment, my recommendation would be to purchase the optimal tire size for the fronts, and the optimal size for the rear.

In my case, I opted to put the 9 inch wheels on all four corners, with 255 45 18s. The 9's fit upfront just fine, and since all four corners are the same, my rotation options are good.

 

Have you noticed how the prices have skyrocketed on all the big name high performance tires? They're all just about out of sight--quickly going to the $275-300+ range. Many people are switching over to Kumho's, Nitto's, Hankook's and Sumitomo's--from $125 to $190 each.

I had to buy one 225-40-18 tire when I caught a pothole in the interstate. Then, my daughter went through a ditch, and I had to buy another 225-40-18 and a 255-40-18 rear tire. Ouch! I've bought 15 tires in the last 18 months.

My tires were great when they were new, but they started howling @ 15K miles. My alignment shop said forget getting 50K miles out any of the low profile high performance summer tires, as they're simply not long lasting.

In the meantime, I just put up with the noise, as there's just no more $ in the tire accrual account at this time.

 

Confused here - did you mean to say you put 8" wheels on all 4 corners ? Above you said "... you can never bring those wider wheels [9"] to the front ..."

Also, anyone know the reasoning behind the 2 different tire/wheel size ?

 

Sorry for the confusion. What I meant was that you never want to have your 9-inch, wider wheels in the front and your 8-inch, more narrow wheels in the back. If you've got a staggered fitment, you must always have the wider wheels in the back. Otherwise, handling gets squirrely.

In my case, I wanted the wider 9-inch wheels of the staggered fitment, but I also wanted to be able to freely rotate my tires around all four corners. This helps prolong tire wear and helps keep tire expenses down.

So I did some investigation, and with the help of guys on this forum, found that I could get FOUR of the wider, 9-inch wheels and put them on all four corners. They fit up front just fine in my case, running 18 x 9 Double Five Wheels with 255 45 18 tires.

As for the reasoning of a staggered fitment...wider tires in the rear put more rubber down where the power is delivered. It also gives a somewhat more aggressive and muscular look to the car. A slightly narrower wheel up front lowers the unsprung weight a bit and helps to accentuate the wider tire in the back.

On my car, I think 18x9s on all four corners looks perfect.

 

[05 XKR with factory 18’s. SO I can put a set of all the same 20





QUOTE=trautobro;448029]My car has 18 inch wheels with staggered fitment tires. 245/45 on front and 255/45 on the rear. Rear rims are 9" wide and fronts are 8" wide.

Can I run the same size tires (either 245 or 255 on both front and rear rims without any problems?

Thanks
Paul[/QUOTE]

 

I have had 255s on all wheels for years never had any problems 👍

 

Not to bring up an old post, but this is the most relevant in my advanced search of the x100 forum, so I'll bring up an old post.

My 2000 XKR that I bought last month has great tires, Michelin sport 4s with great tread life, but unfortunately they are 6 years old and I don't trust performance tires over 5 years old unless they are 5 year old tires I bought and cared for. So I was surprised by what I found out today.

The discount tire I have used, and my other Corvette/ hot rod friends have used for years, tells me I need to replace these ASAP as the incorrect tires are on this car, it has 245's all around and they showed me the wider rear wheels that the 245 is not suppose to even fit on.

So since a tire change is near, someone tell me the widest rear tires they have seen on these, I'd like to do something like a 265 or 275.

Thanks

Edit: well never mind, maybe this post should just be deleted. Discount tire website allows selection of 275 rear tire, I've always had issues getting discount tire to order 285 and 295 KO2's on my trucks over the years so I was very surprised to see this option able to be ordered online. Not really sure why the front is suppose to go down to 235 though seeing as a 245 45 and 275 40 are same diameter...

 

I just buy the factory as delivered size for both ends of the car and have one less decision to clutter my mind with.

And get fine wear at both ends without any tire rotation needed. When the tires are worn out I get a new set and don’t look back.

Z