New Rims 'n Rubber.. DAI Alloy Radial 14", Kumho Solus Vier 185/55/r14's

[northguest47]

Well it was time to pull the trigger and get this purchase done. Car handles pretty much the same, oddly the older yokohama tires seemed to 'sway' less, other than that this car will have plenty of traction in rainy, slushy weather. These rims are 12.9lbs, and the tires are heavy at a whopping 17lbs, unfortunately. I think next summer I will source out some really light tires to see the effect.

I went with these tires because they are the smallest circumference I could find, thus smallest radius, thus maximum torque which is noticeable in 3rd, 4th, and 5th gear roll-ons. Its different is all I can say.. moving from 65 series tires to 55 series tires results in around 6.2% shorter radius so thats around 13 1/2% more torque using an online calculator. Truthfully the old tires were way worn so say splitting the math and going with 7% more torque available at full load is probably more realistic of what these smaller tires can deliver.

What is absolutely amazing is that the car is now smooth rolling at all highway speeds. Its solid, and with the new brakes and all, I may just have to consider putting a turbo on this first gen 1.6L. May just have to, and maybe gut it and put in some gussets, who knows... its a fun project car and now it actually looks sweet. I think the rims and rubber match the lower well, and also the 65 to 55 series lowered the car a further 3/8ths to half an inch.

Hope you like The more I look at it I realize with such small tires 'it doesn't even look that low'