Tires: How wide can you go on stock ray wheels??
 

probably not the best in terms of traction/safety, but it fits

A lot of people are running 305 on the rear, and I will be included in that group post-winter.

I was running (until yesterday!) 305/30 Hankooks on the stock Rays wheel with no problems whatsoever, and I am also running spacers. Here's a pic of my stock wheels with 275/35's in front with a 15mm spacer and 305/30 in the back with a 20mm spacer. No issues at all.

http://www.the370z.com/members/azroa...arter-view.jpg

I just yesterday had my new wheels put on and retained the spacers and the same Hankooks now. Here is that pic.

http://www.the370z.com/members/azroa...ounted-002.jpg

You will have no problems at all running a 305 in the back with the stock wheels. I now intend to lower the car about an inch and I don't anticipate any clearance issues. Alignment issues maybe, but I'm sure that they won't hit anything.

AZ

How does widening decrease safety? and traction? Your gaining traction if anything.

You are stretching a tire beyond its recommendation, there is a reason for that. For racing, it is probably okay. Street tires? I don't know.

The car already plows like a truck stock, extra wide tire in the back and still the skinnys in front? The car will turn worse than my Prius!

You can go to 295's on the front without rubbung but I wouldnt go above 255 for street tires.

If anything you will be making the tire bulge as your putting a slightly to large tire on the rim as opposed to the stretched tire that is on the rear rim now. Also you can go 275 on the front as many people have and that will retain the same 30mm difference in width between the front and rear of the non-Nismo cars. If anything your actually reducing the difference between going 245f 275r to 275f 305r, from a 11% difference front to rear going to 10% difference. Whopping difference, I know :icon17:

After reading this thread I got a bit curious and started looking into this, it seems max for the 10" rear is 295 and for the 9" front would be a 265. So to agree With Cossie I wouldn't go over those sizes.

Personally I think I'm going to go with the Bridgestone. RE11s 265/35 for the front and 285/30 on the rear, it seems that will be the best combination of getting more contact in the rear while also reducing understeer. Any thoughts on that logicc? I'm far from a pro in this area.

Sexy no matter how you spin it.:tup:

I retract my previous comment.:tiphat:
I thought the sport wheels were 10-1/2", but after doing a search, it turns out thats only for the Nismo. :iagree: with the above, 285 series is the max for a 10" wheel without risk of failure or premature wear. Too wide a tire on a narrow wheel will put stress on the shoulders of the tire wall, which could result in excess heat build-up.

I think I have 285 35 in the back, not 285 30. The speedo is more accurate now than with stock tires. I have 265/35 in the front. (RE11)

Next year, I will do 285/35/19 all around. I will stretch the tire in the front, but my car is mostly used for track and autox. I don't have to use the car for commute. I can tell you there is plenty of understeer with the 265/285 setup, you are better off with 265 all around or 285 all around if you plan to race the car and want the car to handle better. God, I get all pi$$ed just thinking about the understeer.

Oh yeah, tire compound is way more important than tire sizing. A little RE11 can still do circles around big V12s. I have both tires on the two cars I own.

I just saw the specs on the RE11, the 275 they have are 30 series, so it might be a little small. I guess 275/30 all around isn't too bad either. Matter of fact, the extra gearing might help it pull off the corner.

I know it is hard to see, but I was struggling a lot harder with the 265/285 RE11 on my 370 vs 235 RA1 all around on my 350 at the same track.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTu3E66mydE 370z
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtASpcAAxZI 350z

Of course as much as I love the RE11s, they are expensive and probably wont last more than 15K.

You are correct on the sizing, they are 265/35 and 285/35. As far as expense I'll only be driving a max of 6-8k miles a year so two years out of them would be plenty for me, also the 285/35 are actually $70 cheaper a tire than the 305/30s at "only" $281 a tire according to tirerack.

Hi,
Small tires up front and large tires in the back do not mean that the car will turn worst then a Prius! IT depends on the car’s need... Check out the Ferrari Enzo for example:
FRONT 245/35 ZR19 – REAR 345/35 ZR19 !! And I am pretty sure it handles pretty well ;)

But I agree with you and most of the others that you should not stretch a tire beyond its recommendation. A therefore, I do not suggest going with tires that require rims of 10.5” if you have the stock wheels. ...I won’t !

Too bad I can't find 305's that fit on 10" wheels... :(

Thats exactly what he is saying, the car needs larger tires in the front as it already understeers with 30mm difference between them. So by making the difference front to rear larger by going bigger in the rear and staying the same in the front your going to have more understeer.

Nissan engineers have spent countless hours testing proper tire sizes for the stock set up. Any deviation is pointless and may cause negative handling issues. But, what do I know.

And they spent countless hours determining the amount of power the car will make, the spring rates, the ride height, the swaybar stiffness yet they can all be improved upon, why not tires too?

Though you make it sound like you have some knowledge in the area so please share as thats the whole point of the thread.

enzo has the engine in the back, they are not balanced to begin with!

nissan put stagger tires to protect the guys who cant drive, not because it is fast. also are you telling me the re050a are good tires? really?

I hate to say it but the OEMs look better IMHO!

If they had some concavity, they would be straight sex. It will also look much better when lowered in my opinion.

I THINK that 275s on the front 9" rim would be to wide just like 305s on the rear 10" would be to wide, from what I was reading 265 front is the most thats adviseable. Also increasing the tire size will give some added traction but the real increase will come from putting better rubber on it, going from say the RE05s to RE11s.

:iagree:

The sport package has 9.5" wheels on the front and 275's fit just fine. I knew I was getting new wheels for my Z when I bought the tires so I purchased 305's for the back. My new rear wheels are 10.5" and the 305's fit great on them.

AZ

mine has 19x9

Are the they stock Sport Package wheels? The Sport Package came with 9.5's and 10's.

AZ

Sport package wheels are 19x9 & 19x10
Nismo wheels are 19x9.5 & 19x10.5

You are correct. I stand corrected. Been dealing with spec'ing, purchasing, mounting wheels all week and it all kind of ran together. Anyway, my new wheels are 9.5" & 10.5". Trust me, it's hell gettin' old!

AZ

Running 305's on stock rims is fine, plenty of members here are running this setup. The mustang and camaro guys run fat tires all around all the time with no problem. Ive even seen a couple 315s on 10 in rims.
Also I'm pretty sure this isnt stretching the tire, in fact its bulges out.

You are stretching the sidewall beyond what it is meant to do. You are playing with words here....

ah gotcha, when i think stretched tire, i think of thishttp://japanesenostalgiccar.com/blog...re-560x418.png

It wont cause the tire to blow out or anythign of that nature but it does change how the tire sits on the road and from what I read that can be a very bad thing.

I think stretched tires are ugly and highly compromises safety. For daily driving, you can go one step up from stock for a little more grip. 255/45/19 fronts and 285/35/19 rears.

A mild stretch is actually beneficial as it serves to keep the sidewall stiffer, keeping the tire from rolling over it. By mild I mean the stretch we are running with 275s on a 10" rim.

I agree, but stretch like the pic above is just absurd.

275 on a 9" wheel is exact spec for width according to discount. You will not rub unless you lower your car over an inch. I'm running 275x35x19 on a 19x9 F and 305x30x19 on a 19x11 R with around a 1inch drop.

Don't be fooled, handling characteristics will improve. Nissan would dip into their profits by putting wider tires/wheels on the Z. I would say try to avoid increasing the stagger though. On a side note, it looks like there is plenty of room for 315s in the rear if you want a more aggressive look. :tup:

255/285 seems to work beautifully for me.

Has the 285/35 RE-11 tire been discontinued?

For some reason specs are not listed for it on Potenza website :confused: