View Single Post
      02-17-2007, 03:03 PM   #6
JK42
First Lieutenant
JK42's Avatar
19
Rep
374
Posts

Drives: E70 BMW X5 4.8i
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Northern Europe

iTrader: (0)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Briteboy[iCE] View Post
make sure you get 16" wheels for snow wheels, looks dumb but performs great!
Just remember that many bigger-engined BMW's these days (including series as old as E46 and E39) have a minimum wheel size of 17", such as the 330Ci/330i/330xi/330d/330xd, Z4 3.0si etc. - in the case of M BMW's, 18" is often the minimum because of the brake caliper size. 18" is the current minimum for Z4 M's, M5 and M6. For example, the M5 and M6 have a special wheel type for 18" winter tires, the type number 184:

http://crass.on.ru/bmw/wheels/TMP_wh..._wheel_184.jpg

If you look at it's info page, it mentions that it is specifically an 18" wheel for winter tire use - summer tires on those cars are and should be at least 19":

http://crass.on.ru/bmw/wheels/style/style_184.htm

Your car manual will sometimes detail the minimum wheel size and also your reseller can confirm whether a particular wheel will fit your BMW model or not. You should always check with a reseller when buying new wheels and tires, and whenever possible, purchase only original BMW wheels. You can then buy the tires somewhere else and have them installed on the original BMW wheels if you want to save $$$ on the tires - that's usually wise, because at least over here, the BMW dealers charge huge overprices when it comes to tires, and the original wheels aren't cheap to begin with either. But you can always trust them, when copy wheels (especially copies of BMW's original wheels) can often turn out to be made from shitty materials, may be very heavy, very easy to damage and get dents on and can even be deadly dangerous if they haven't been tested properly at high speeds. This is not to bash known third party wheel manufacturers such as BBS etc. - I'm sure their wheels are fine, but they just don't look good on BMW's in my opinion. IMHO BMW has always been one of the car manufacturers that has had the best looking original wheel selection to go with it's cars, so I have never had a problem finding many very good-looking wheel options to choose from for any BMW model. Perhaps the exception being the M models where the selection is usually quite limited, maybe only 1 or at best 2 models to choose from, but usually the default ones are so cool that you don't want anything else (take for example, the default 19" wheels for the M6.) - and the same wheels kind of become a part of that particular M car type. M3 CSL had it's own special wheels that would set it apart from regular M3s, for example.

Best regards,

Jussi
Appreciate 0