Need thoughts on wheel/tire/suspension mod

[robrwalker]

Hello all,

First, thanks to those who provided insight on the windscreen issue - i installed the OEM kit last night and its amazing! Went out at 55 degrees going 85 and not even my wife was cold!

Now I am moving on to a wheel mod...and I wanted opinions from those who have changed out wheels/tires/suspensions

1. Wheels
My plan is to replace my stock 17's with 18's or 19's but I do not want to create a significantly rougher ride. I know generally how it feels to move up 2 inches from stock wheels (old car went from 15 to 17), so I dont need basic info, but for those of you who have done this, do you notice a major roughness change? Maybe go with 18's to avoid the issue?

2. Tires
I have heard moving from the stock, run flats, to a regular radial actually makes for a much smoother ride, especially with respect to the car getting a little squirrelly on the highway. Thoughts? I am hoping 19's with new rubber will end up not being much rougher than what I already have with the 17's and the run flats

3. suspension
What do you all suggest regarding suspension changes? All I really want is a style change - to drop the car down about 1-2 inches to fill the wheel well with the new wheels/tires. I am not looking to take this car on the track. Also dont want to go too low..its a daily driver

My question is whether is it appropriate on this car to just do a spring change out to achieve this? Some cars have camber problems and other wear and tear problems when you lower them...do you think I need to spend $$$ to go the route of coil overs and all new suspension?

Thanks in advance for those who offer insight.

And when I do go down this road, if anyone is looking for stock 3.0i wheels and tires with about 5K miles on them, let me know. Wheels are in mint condition and are the 10 spoke style that you can see on the z4 when you look on the bmw website in the build your own section

[mpower03]

Originally Posted by robrwalker

Hello all,

First, thanks to those who provided insight on the windscreen issue - i installed the OEM kit last night and its amazing! Went out at 55 degrees going 85 and not even my wife was cold!

Now I am moving on to a wheel mod...and I wanted opinions from those who have changed out wheels/tires/suspensions

1. Wheels
My plan is to replace my stock 17's with 18's or 19's but I do not want to create a significantly rougher ride. I know generally how it feels to move up 2 inches from stock wheels (old car went from 15 to 17), so I dont need basic info, but for those of you who have done this, do you notice a major roughness change? Maybe go with 18's to avoid the issue?

2. Tires
I have heard moving from the stock, run flats, to a regular radial actually makes for a much smoother ride, especially with respect to the car getting a little squirrelly on the highway. Thoughts? I am hoping 19's with new rubber will end up not being much rougher than what I already have with the 17's and the run flats

3. suspension
What do you all suggest regarding suspension changes? All I really want is a style change - to drop the car down about 1-2 inches to fill the wheel well with the new wheels/tires. I am not looking to take this car on the track. Also dont want to go too low..its a daily driver

My question is whether is it appropriate on this car to just do a spring change out to achieve this? Some cars have camber problems and other wear and tear problems when you lower them...do you think I need to spend $$$ to go the route of coil overs and all new suspension?

Thanks in advance for those who offer insight.

And when I do go down this road, if anyone is looking for stock 3.0i wheels and tires with about 5K miles on them, let me know. Wheels are in mint condition and are the 10 spoke style that you can see on the z4 when you look on the bmw website in the build your own section

1. i went from an 18 to a 19 and the ride isn't that much harsher, but i changed from run flats.
2. yes that is true, the run flat tires are harder tires, non rft are softer. So moving to 19's with nonrft tires my car is firmer, but smoother if you know what i mean. but from 17 to 19s the tire profile is going to be a bigger difference so you will see a bigger difference than i did.
3. it depends on how much money you want to spend. if i were you i would get koni shocks with eibach springs. Should be a little less than $1000.00. Or you could go with blistein pss9, kw's (I don't know exactly which ones that have for the 3.0i available), check out dinan's suspension also.
here is a few quick threads i found about that setup.
http://www.zpost.com/forums/showthre...ht=koni+shocks
http://www.zpost.com/forums/showthre...ht=koni+shocks

Hope that helps!

[dfine]

i just went form the 17" with RFT to 18" with non-RFT and I like it, feels much better, smoother, to me it does not feel any harder than before. And I like the handling better.

[robrwalker]

mpower03 - thanks for the thread links...will check them out.

Thanks to all who gave input...will post pics when I have some.