brianZortiz Posted July 12, 2012 Share Posted July 12, 2012 Hey guys! I recently sold my Rota rbr 17x9.5 and 17x8.5 to buy some suitable wheels for me. The 17" wheels were a bit to big for me as I wasn’t running zg flares, but I’ve seen the Rbr's with ZG flares and it wasn’t the look I was going for. I needed a more aggressive stance that was functional and had nice deep lips. In my opinion 17" rims are big and 15" is too small for me, but common snappers 18" work wheel car is an exception. I kept looking into the limited 16" market and was interested in Watanabe rs, SSR XR4 deep lip (15" I know), and CCW classics. I started with the watanabe and was quoted $3,000USD, that is way too much as I’ve seen the group buy here a set would have run $2,400 a few years back. I guess we can blame the USD value today. Then I looked into SSR XR4 and the ones I’ve seen only come in at 15" and required a lot of money and work to get them with a deep lip like I wanted. I then tried CCW, but it wasn’t there for me. I actually couldn’t find wheels that I wanted so I looked to resort on the new Varrstoen V3 wheels for temporary use, they had bad customer service and not the sizes I wanted so I quit. I then (Finally) had my eyes on the BBS RS wheels that are a 3 piece lightweight wheel. I haven’t seen a set of BBS rs on any s30z so I went to a used wheel store here in socal and worked with the owner for the size I was looking for and I pulled the trigger on an authentic used set of 16" BBS rs. The first picture is at its current state. I am waiting on 3" lips front and 4" lips rear or 3.5" front and 4" rear, but thinking of going 4.5" rear. I have a couple of weeks to decide. Once I have the lips, I will get the centers drilled for 4x114 then dip the face in chrome and have everything installed back with gold bolts or thinking of powder coating centers red. The final specs of the wheels will be 16x9 front -6 and 16x10-16 rear, that is with 3 and 4 inch lips. I think that would fill in my zg flares. I decided to go with these wheels because I haven’t seen them on an s30z and has a big aftermarket for spare parts, lips, and barrels. I hope to finish in September, but I doubt in time for JCCS. The next two pictures are to show you guys some examples of how they will look (except color) when I am finished. I will keep you guys updated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cockerstar Posted July 12, 2012 Share Posted July 12, 2012 Looking forward to seeing the final product! What are you planning for tires? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted July 12, 2012 Author Share Posted July 12, 2012 I really don't know. I was thinking of 245/40/16 rear and 215/40/16. I like a little stretch on tires, but I dislike the excessive stretch. Got any input on tire selection? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h4nsm0l3m4n Posted July 12, 2012 Share Posted July 12, 2012 (edited) Very cool. I looked for the longest time to try to find 16" wheels I could get new barrels for. At the time decent street tires were only really offered in 1 size - 225/50-16. In the end I scrapped the whole thing and when to 17s because tire selection was so poor. Luckily, Bridgestone just started finally making RE-11s in 245/45-16 size. These are an awesome tire! For slight stretch maybe go with 225/50-16s front and 245/45-16s rear. Edited July 12, 2012 by h4nsm0l3m4n Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted July 12, 2012 Author Share Posted July 12, 2012 Oops I meant to say 245 45 16 rear and 215 40 16 front or 225 40 16 front. I think the guys with watanabe 16x9 and 9.5 mostly run 245 45 16 on all corners. I'll look into your suggestion. What 17's do you have? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ComicArtist Posted July 13, 2012 Share Posted July 13, 2012 Definitely following this. RS's are some of my all time favorite wheels. Very classy, I'd love to pick up a set for mine. I don't exactly know what your taste in stretch is, but personally a 205 on a 9 looks good in my opinion, and a 225 on a 10 is also tasteful. Honestly a 245 isn't going to stretch much on a 10. I'm running 205/50's all the way around on my 10's, but with a 16 and a lower sidewall you might want to increase the treadwidth a good 20cm. Just my take, you might want to try rimtuck.com for more examples of tire sizing. Just for an idea, here's what my 205's look like on 10's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted July 13, 2012 Author Share Posted July 13, 2012 @Comic. Thanks. I like the stretch. Will you be addIng negative camber? Those wheels do fill the zg flares nicely. Thank you for the pics and link. I've seen 205 on 9.5 and 225 on 11's. Search 240z rb25 fresh paint on YouTube, I really like how that came out too. I hear you in the 245 not having much of a stretch at all. Thats my only area of concern is tires. 16" doesn't have a big tire market. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramblinon9 Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 Check the center bore of your centers. I'm running a set of rs's on my 76' and the center of the bore didn't clear my front hub. Not sure on specs of different years. I ended up running a 25 mm adapter to make them work. I have some pics of my car if you're interested. I'm at 16x8 with a 2 inch lip up front. And 16x9 with 2.5 inch lip. But I'm not running flares just tried to fill out the stock fenders. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted July 19, 2012 Author Share Posted July 19, 2012 (edited) Hey, yes I did measurements today and front center is not goin to clear bore. I have a friend who is going to open up the centers a little to fit. A spacer does work since hub is tapered and only needs a little more to sit. Well you beat me to it. Hey send me some pictures at brianzkills@yahoo.com or post them. Also I sure center caps will for over dust cap. I did some measuring and it seems that they will clear. Let me know about that. Edited July 19, 2012 by brianZortiz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramblinon9 Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 Luckkyyy I wish I could have had them machined out rather than running such a big adapter, but oh well. As far as center hex's go, if you're going to be mounting flat onto hub surface you should definitely be able to run full height hex's, possibly half heights. Quarter heights and flat caps are almost certainly out of the question. My quarter heights wouldn't clear the dust caps and I wasn't even flat against the hub surface yet. That is just my experiences with my wheels. Depending on the back pad depth of your centers it could change, there are many variables that come into play with these things. I almost called it quits many times when I was building mine, realllllly got frustrated. But just stick with it, the look is superb. And hopefully you'll have better luck with yours since I just kind of went for it without much planning, sounds like you have your stuff together a lot more than I did before hand haha. As far as being the first, I wasn't the first either, I found a few pics of rs's on an s30. They weren't a "fitted" look though. Plus you're gonna beat me to running rs's with flares! I wanted to do that originally but I'm scared to cut my fenders haha. Anyway, picture time! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramblinon9 Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 Oh and I'm running 205/45 in the rears and 205/40 front. Kumho ecsta's ast. IMO I would have liked a little more stretch in the front but Kumho's run a little wide compared to say a fallken 512 which damn near everyone runs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ComicArtist Posted July 19, 2012 Share Posted July 19, 2012 Thanks! Haven't measured the camber yet, just eyeballed it to be even on each side and fit the flares. Waiting on an alignment until I can get LCA's. Estimating around -4 front and -2 or -3 in the rear. I was wondering about the center bore as well, good to know that. 16" tires aren't too expensive, you can find Federals or Falkens in a 205/45 fairly easily. EDIT: here's a link to both http://www.onlinetires.com/products/vehicle/tires/federal/205%252F45-16+federal+ss-595+83v+bsw.html http://www.onlinetires.com/products/vehicle/tires/falken/205%252F45-16+falken+ziex+ze-912+87v+bsw.html Don't know if you plan on tracking it at all, but I've drifted on both and they're both great tires. And the 912's stretch very nicely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrKrispy1183 Posted July 21, 2012 Share Posted July 21, 2012 Aah, RSs. I had my set almost built for my Z a couple of years back, and just ended up selling them due to time constraints. I'd like to build a set again, but I may just take the money and have a friend's wheel company build something just as awesome to my specs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted July 21, 2012 Author Share Posted July 21, 2012 @ramblino, nice car. Yaj luckily I have someone to do the work for me. As I hear feedback, it's going to take a little More work, but I won't be giving up. Im going to on you with some q's if you dot mind. @Comic, awesome, I need LCA too. Thanks for the links, yup 16" new can run me no more than $80 a piece, which is not bad. I ran hankook hs2 or vs2 I forgot, but they where really good tires. I plan on tracking my car like at willow springs, but I have only done a small track(slow) by my house, Adams motoraport park in SoCal. I'll look into your tires. Great price! @MrKrispy, get them done.! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramblinon9 Posted July 23, 2012 Share Posted July 23, 2012 No problem man, that's what I'm here for. Don't hesitate to ask! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted August 23, 2012 Author Share Posted August 23, 2012 I got a call from wheel place and they wanted to know how much to open up center to it my hub. I think it's 73mm, can anyone let me know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrKrispy1183 Posted August 24, 2012 Share Posted August 24, 2012 73.1-73.2mm if they can get that precise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted August 24, 2012 Author Share Posted August 24, 2012 Awesome. Thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brianZortiz Posted September 14, 2012 Author Share Posted September 14, 2012 Update: wheels are almost done, just need to choose color. I like orange like the air box on 240z/260z air cleaner. It's Chevrolet orange. I found this: http://www.stanceworks.com/2011/09/miata-that-could/ Don't know what color to powder coat, I have 904 white z. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZROSSA Posted September 14, 2012 Share Posted September 14, 2012 I love BBS wheels. I have been looking for a set for my 635 for a while but theyare very expensive here. Anyway, Anything will go with white. I think a lot will depend on the final finish of your Z. If you have a stock look with crome bumpers and so forth i thing BBS gold would be the best look. I think I would choose BBS gold no mater what. If you have color coded bumper and maybe a bit of extra fiberglass added on maybe go with a wicked bright red. Its up to you! Cheers, Douglas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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