Ideal wheel width?
 

Would love any opinions on the advantages/disadvantages of certain wheel widths for a DD with some autox days.

I'm thinking of sticking with a 17in wheel I'm just not sure what width to go and what size tires will give me the ideal setup.

Any thoughts would be great.

Thanks!

for stock, 8" width wheel IMO

lots or variation in tire width in the same size from manufacturer to manufaturer, For example:

OEM Michelin Primacy 215/45/17 Tread Width 7.5" Rim width 7"-8" 844 rev/mile

Hankook RS3 215/45/17 Tread Width 7.9" Rim width 7"-8" 843 rev/mile
Yokahoma AD08 215/45/17 Tread Width 8.0" Rim Width 7"-8" 847 rev/mile

Yokahoma AD08 225/45/17 Tread Width 8.5" Rim Width 7"-8.5" 836 rev/mile
Dunlop ZII StarSpec 225/45/17 Tread Width 8.2" Rim Width 7"=8.5" 837 rev/mile

I ended up going with 17x8 wheel (ssr type c, one of the lightest 17x8's you can get) and the 225/45 AD08. In 225 45 the AD08 has a full inch (25.4mm) of tread width over the oem 215/45 Michelin but is only slightly taller than stock. Combined with the much stickier compond this setup has WAY more grip than stock.

Also, notice the Hankook, in stock size, has a .4" advantage in tread width over stock but is the same height as stock.

It's going to come down to what you care more about.. with a soft compound and good design a 215 or 225 on an 8" rim is a really good fit and weight. You can go wider and run less aggressive tread compound but you will sacrifice weight to do so.

For my next set, i may do the 215/45 AD08 on my 17x8's simply to get the gearing advantage.. But, i will be giving up a 1/2" or tread width to do that....

Good info so far! Appreciate the thoughts.

To give an idea about what I plan to do with the car to better make the wheel/tire choice:

I'd like to add some performance to the car but I'm not a track day fiend even though I most definitely will be planning on doing that a few times a year. I'm looking to get into autox as much as I can over the year though. So really I'm not sure if 7.5 or 8 width matters all that much if I put some really nice tires on them? I'm truly open to anything as this is a new area of attention for me with this being my first RWD car. I come from the land of STi swapped GC/GF Imprezas.

I'm not trying to become the best of the best or anything so I don't think I'll need to be putting on 265's or anything in that realm. Ideally I'd love to get an affordable set of wheels that are light to avg weight and put some good rubber on them.

On the not so performance end of it, I really do like the more meaty tire look than "show car" low profile vibe.

The "best" auto cross tire may tend to "go off" to quickly on a road course. Autocross you want peak grip without having to put much heat into the tire. Road course you want stable grip over a longer time period (20 minutes rather than 1 minute) and most likely a higher operating temp.

You also need to consider the class rules with autocross if you want to be competative as that will determine your tire and wheel choices.

If you're doing auto-x get the biggest rim allowed for the class you're going to participate in. Likely STX, meaning 9inch front and rear.

Won't a 9in width kind of take some of the fun out of the car? Granted grip can be great fun as well but I would hate to fully get rid of the "loose end" you can get out of the car.

Also regarding a 9in width, can you even run something that wide on the stock suspension without modification? I'm sure at some point down the line I'll invest in a nice suspension setup but that day is far away.

If you're talking about the responsiveness, the wheel width has less to do with that than tread width and sidwall. You can easily fit a 9" wide wheel on these cars, too. I'm not sure of the highest offset that'll clear the front perch, but somewhere between +30-40mm offset is fine. And while I haven't played with sizing much on mine yet, from reading other peoples' experiences it seems that keeping the tire width below max for the wheel is a good way to keep that tight feel. It keeps the sidewalls slightly stretched, rather than flared outward, as this keeps limits the skewing of the tread to the wheel (less side-side movement, if that makes sense).

On fully stock suspension, I had used my leftover set that is 17x9 +28 with 235/45 Federals. Those run wide, and that's a bit taller than stock size and I had no clearance issues, although the front had more poke than I liked. I added camber bolts, but can't remember which wheels I was on at the time. One of these days I want to put them back on to see how they fit with a bit of negative camber and the RCE Yellow springs. It was a really meaty look and I kind of miss that.

I think next I'd like to try a 17x or 18x9 with a 245 tire. But my MPSS have a ways to go yet, so I'm in no rush.

I have a 9.5 on the back in my car, 9's fit fine. (I didn't read the rules first, now I'm stuck in STU where I'm terribly uncompetitive)

I wouldn't say it takes the fun out, these car still make enough power to swing the rear end out. I've spun a couple of times getting too aggressive on the throttle at events last year.

It really depends what you're looking for. Grip is what you need for auto-x, there was a few guys last year running on stock rims and tires and they were bordering on out of control for the whole run. Fun? Yes. Posted good times? Hell no.