18's vs 17's

[Bule]

£120 to refurbish a diamond cut Thermisto, or £155 plus £12.50 delivery for a new Thermisto wheel from Bickertons Skoda.  There's the dilemma!

Edited 29 August, 2014 by Bule

[Hoverurb]

Finally got a set of Audi A6 wheels with almost new 225/50/17's.  It has changed the car completely, no more crash bang on even the smallest of potholes, So far I've done 400km on them and I'm not going back to 40 profile. And before anybody asks I've checked with my insurance company and all is good.

[andrehj]

@Hoverurb: Can you post a picture of your car with these wheels?

[Hoverurb]

With Audi A6 wheels , 225/50/17 tyres

Edited 17 September, 2014 by Hoverurb

[Superb170]

With Audi A6 wheels , 225/50/17 tyres

Nice one! They look very well and really suit the car! You'd hardly notice that they are not actual Skoda wheels

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Hoverurb]

They had quite a selection to suit but it came down to those or a set of 5 spoke Audi's . I had taken my design consultant with me and she preferred the multi spoke so I did not get a lot of "You want to spend MORE money" LOL. Kingdom Alloys also fitted the Skoda center stickers and a set of black VW stud covers .

[andrehj]

With Audi A6 wheels , 225/50/17 tyres

I think it looks very well, much better than original. Do you experience any drawbacks? Is there enough space in the wheel arches? And also when the front wheel are at full lock and you drive into a (higher) driveway?

 

Just found out that the new Octavia Scout also has 225/50R17 tyres, so it's starting to become quite a common dimension for Skoda.

Edited 17 September, 2014 by andrehj

[Hoverurb]

No problem with clearance, checked it out before fitting them.  The only problem is that 225/50/17 seem to be dearer than other sizes.  

[Superb170]

They had quite a selection to suit but it came down to those or a set of 5 spoke Audi's . I had taken my design consultant with me and she preferred the multi spoke so I did not get a lot of "You want to spend MORE money" LOL. Kingdom Alloys also fitted the Skoda center stickers and a set of black VW stud covers .

That's put me thinking alright although I do love the L&K wheels and would find it hard to part with them - almost time to change the first set now (at less than 30k kms  ) so for now I'll see what a higher profile tyre does and might consider a wheel change later on.  Comfort isn't too bad now that I'm used to it, its just noise.  They seem to have a good selection of alloys available there alright - I've passed that place many times!

[Smudgers]

Interesting topic,

 

I have the 18" Sirius wheels and think they look great on the L&K. Ride quality wise I would say that its quite firm but well damped - cars not bouncing all over the place when I hit a pothole on a bend for example.

 

I moved to Superb from a Citroen C5 with the hydro pneumatic suspension on 19" wheels so I was expecting a different quality of ride - Citroen just soaked up everything and you get the "Magic Carpet" ride over all but the most atrocious road surfaces. So compared with Citroen ride was hard but when compared with other half's MX5 MK3 Superb ride is good. I have never experienced any of the wallowing on motorways or twitchiness that other people have posted about and I do keep tire pressures as shown inside fuel filler cap.

 

For the winter I fit a set of 16" alloys with 205/55R16 Conti Winter Contact TS850 tires. This certainly does improve ride quality in as much as the smaller bumps are absorbed by the tire wall. Due to the smaller contact patch car will drift more on corners when being pushed but noise is also reduced. Once again I run them at the pressures shown inside the fuel filler cap for the 16" wheel - perhaps a few extra PSI may stop the drifting - not sure ? Tend to run November to March.

 

I have checked with my insurer (Aviva) and they are fine with the 16" wheels being fitted as its a size that the manufacture recommends for the vehicle

 

I was reading Autocar where they have a review of the MX5 Mk4, the car has been on a diet and the designer pointed out that they are fitting smaller wheels to the Mk4 as for every extra inch of wheel diameter the weight of the wheel increases by 1kg ! So smaller wheels = less un sprung mass = better handling.

 

Who knows perhaps over the coming years we will see a move to smaller wheels with larger walled tires (look at F1 wheels and tires) which I guess would give better ride and better handling - So why do we drive on big wheels and small walls - because they look better !

 

When driving our cars we cannot see our lovely wheels so I can only think we are prepared to sacrifice ride and handling for the benefit of others who look at our cars - that's good of us

[Hoverurb]

Yes my !8's looked great but that was when it was moving , they didn't look all that good when I needed another new tyre. There's very little difference in handling with the 225/50/17's as far as I can see during normal driving and that's with the mid range tyres that came fitted to the wheels. I'll fit something better when I wear them down. My 18's will probably fitted to my sons Golf just to make it look good, but thats fine, each to his own.

The easiest way to reduce weight is probably to fit steel wheels, strangely alloys were first used to reduce weight. 

 

I checked the speedo reading today against a GPS and it reading 1 - 2% over which means its still legal.

[Camberley_Chris]

Swapped my original 18" Luxons for 17" Wolfrace Eurosport Turismos with 225/45/R17 Goodyear Eagle F1 Assymetric 2 91Y's - all supplied by Rochford Tyres (www.alloywheels.com).

My Superb is coming up to it's 3rd birthday at the end of November - and hence it's first MOT. The existing 18" tyres were almost down to the warning indicator and needed replacing so now was an obvious time to change the wheels too.

Went for a short drive and the difference was immediately apparent. Cornering is now so light yet positive, with none of the roll of before. The pressure decal inside the filler cap cover recommends the same pressures for 225/45R17's as the previous 225/40/R18's which I used to run at 2.4Bar rather than 2.2Bar owing to all the potholes in our roads so I'm using 2.4Bar again.If that seems a little hard I might drop to 2.2Bar later.

The only minor niggle is that I can't use the Skoda badges as they are slightly smaller than the holes in the wheels. Maybe there is a larger badge or an adapter? I'll research that but if anyone knows I'd appreciate feedback.

Overall, I'm delighted and recommend this conversion.