15" wheels in ITB

[itb76]

Has anyone gone to 15" wheels on an ITB car and noticed an advantage over 14", on a car where 14" is the stock size? A search really didn't come up with anything, and I am in need of new wheels.

Your comments please!

[Knestis]

I think Beran was on 15s at mid-O. I walked up late and missed the conversation about how he felt about them.

K

[RacerBill]

I have 15"s on my ITB car (because that's what the spec line call for). The hardest part of 15 inch wheels in ITB is trying to find a reasonable weight at a reasonable price in 6 inch width (I know that's subjective, but....). Now, go up to 6.5 inch, and there are a billion, well, maybe just a million, of them.

[924Guy]

'sall I can and do run, stock size...

[BruceG]

Great question, Lenny. I've wondered the same thing. I've got 14's on my ITB Mustang. One advantage appears to be more tire selections on the 15's.

Hope you find out more.

Best Regards,

Bruce

[924Guy]

Great question, Lenny. I've wondered the same thing. I've got 14's on my ITB Mustang. One advantage appears to be more tire selections on the 15's.

Hope you find out more.

Best Regards,

Bruce

Have you caught on to the 14" 924 wheel upgrade for the ITB Mustangs?? Just have to hog out the hub centers to fit on the fronts, but the bolt pattern's correct. And the 14x6" 8-spoke 924 rims are common, reasonably light, and not popular...

[BruceG]

Cool..thanks Vaughan!

[Beran]

Yes I run both 14" and 15". I will mount different sizes to see what I get best results with. I ran the 15" rims with 225/45/15 Hoosiers at Mid- Ohio for the first day then went to the 14" for the second day. The 15" were better since the overall height is very close but the sidewall is much shorter on the 15" then the 14". Last year at the ARRC I ran 225/50/15 which is even taller. I had good results with that combination.

Bill hit the nail on the head. Good 15" rims with the correct width are expensive. They are easy to find. Just pick the phone up and call tire rack since you will NOT find them on the web site.
Just weighed them all this week and the 15" rims that I have weigh 20lbs less than the 14"....... Note to self, just use the 15" from now on.

While we are on the topic... I noticed an MK2 Golf that was running 13" rims at Mid-Ohio last weekend. At the time I did not think about it but now someone else mentioned that no MK2's came with 13" rims and that person should not have been able to run them. Although I think it might be a disadvantage to run the 13" ones.

Any thoughts on the R6 versus the A6 Hoosier compound? I have only run the R6. Vaughan - what did you run at Mid-Ohio?

[924Guy]

I've run the A6's at home (Waterford), but ran the R's at Mid-O... inadvertently got a perfect opportunity to benchmark the A's vs. the R's at last year's ARRC when we ended up with an A6 on the LF, R's the rest of the way around! Can only blame the tire guy, not to mention ourselves for not catching that! grrr...

Anyway, yes, those A's really are quick at the get-go, but do fade a good bit after a little while - how long depending on where you're running. I figured they're really suck at Mid-O, at the IT-Fest, with such long races - I prefer my car to be at its best at the end of the race, when the driver's at his worst!!! You could probably do OK to qualify on the A's anywhere. I do notice them falling off in the last few laps of a 15-minute sprint at Waterford, our usual race length, though Waterford is admittedly hard on tires, never any cool-down time mid-lap. The added cool-down time might help them at a larger track for maybe a 10-lapper, but I still wouldn't bother with them for anything longer.

Then there's the question of wear rates; they seem to only wear slightly quicker than the R's at Waterford... getting 3 weekends there (12 heat cycles) seems to be a dicey proposition with A's, more readily achievable with R's.

Can't really compare speed definitively, as I haven't been pushing them all that hard at Waterford this year since Doug dropped off the ITB map...

[shwah]

I would be surprised if less than 50% of the A2 Golfs delivered were not on 13" wheels. The only ones that were not were GTI and Golf GT trim levels.

[itb76]

...One advantage appears to be more tire selections on the 15's...

That's ironic, more tire selections but you can't find wheels. I'll take a serious look at 15s, the sidewall on my 205/55-14s looks ridiculously tall and I can't see where that extra sidewall helps.

Thanks for the feedback.

... I noticed an MK2 Golf that was running 13" rims at Mid-Ohio last weekend...

I'm surprised they cleared the brakes.

[Knestis]

The ITCS lists 13s for the Golf II so if there's an issue, it's there. Remember that they only have to have come on ANY of the models/trim levels included in the spec line. Anyone see evidence one way or the other...?

K

[Bill Miller]

The ITCS lists 13s for the Golf II so if there's an issue, it's there. Remember that they only have to have come on ANY of the models/trim levels included in the spec line. Anyone see evidence one way or the other...?

K

I'm pretty sure the '85 base Golf came w/ 13" wheels, and only the GTI's came w/ 14" wheels. I know the 13" and 14" have been listed on the Mk II 8v ITB spec line for years. I'm not sure when the 13's went away.

[Dave Zaslow]

Yes they really used 13" wheels. E**a lists 5.5 x 13" wheels over a number of years.

DZ