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MG MGB GT V8 Factory Originals Technical - Wheel Width

My V8 B came with 15" minilite (copies) which are 6" wide (6J) with 195/65 tyres. Although I have had them re-balanced to make sure that is ok, I still find the steering feels bad, wobbling and lots of banging and shaking through the wheel. Could this be that the wheels are just too wide for the B? The rack and other gear is all new and standard MGB. I could change to Owners Club telescopic system if this would help?
T Green

The two things that occur to me are to check the front wheel bearings and to have the wheel balance checked on the car. I've been using 15x6J rims for years and although the ride is a little harsher than you would normally expect with 14 inch rims there have been no other problems.

Regards,

Dave
Dave Brooke

I run the same wheels and find them excellent, except that I had to flare the rear wheel arches to accomodate them, I think your problem lies elsewhere

Mike
Michael barnfather

Dave,

Do you know a garage that checks Wheel balance on car?

I would agree with others in that it is not wheel size.

Could be wheels not true rather than unbalanced or a tyre problem so swithing front and rear side at a time may identify a problem wheel.

S/C bearing UJ's and bushes etc Ok.

Paul
Paul

Hi there Mr T,

When I got my V8 it hadn't been used much and the tyres had hardened and flat spotted. I had the tyres balanced twice. The second time on the assumption that the first place hadn't done a good job. When I watched the wheel on the balancing machine you could clearly see the tyre was out of round. New tyres fixed the problem. Try jacking up each front corner, spin the tyre by hand and watch the gap between the tyre and the ground. FWIW my tyres were date stamped and were only two years old. :-)

Phil
Philip Shingler

As a general rule there seems to be a significant difference in the ride between 195 and 185 tyres - but there are cheaper tyres about which make it worse.
We had some cheapies on another wagon last year that simply wouldn't balance.

For the record; it's generally accepted that 195/55 X 15 is the biggest combination that will fit under all load/conditions ..... but someone may know otherwise.
Roger

My local tyre places can't even balance centre-locks on the machine, let alone on the car. They just don't have the correct 'cones' to clamp the wheel at the correct places. Just had two new tyres and he showed me a significant wobble on the machine whereas there is none when back on the hubs. I also had one set of tyres on the original alloys that caused phased wheel wobble for their whole life despite repeated attempts at rebalancing. The set before, and since, give no such problems.
Paul Hunt

Roger,

Ive got 195x65x15 on mine with Minotaur wheels, I needed to flare the arches slightly, and grind off quite a lot of the inner flange to stop the tyres rubbing.

I had to centre my axle first, most MG's have offset axles for reasons which nobody can explain, this can cause additional problems.

Mike
Michael barnfather

Axle centreing, now there's a subject. The axle *is* centred, it is the arch panels that are off so nothing more than cosmetic. Centreing the axle within the arches makes it crab-wise wrt the front axle.
Paul Hunt

Michael - yes - granted it's a very minot body mod ! 65s would be more comfortable than 55s.

Paul - as I have always suspected - but not all our cousins will be pleased to read your message.

Best wishes
Roger

I have 195/65/15 tires, Yoko Avids & Toyos on 2 cars with 15 x 6 1/2" wheels with no clearance problems, but my rears are wire wheel width, about 1 3/4" narrower than the MGB steel wheel axle. The clearance problem can be avoided in another way by specifying a different wheel off set.
Jim Stuart

Ah, all is explained about the axle offset. I did double check my axle because it is obviously offset but there is no room for error in any of the spring hangers or fixings so I concluded it must be something to do with how the (nearside) wing is fitted. My old B was worse than my present one.
I have fitted standard rear springs which seem to help the rubbing problems. But previous owner has bent in the flange around the wheel arch, which I am not too happy about because of rust problems.
I thought I would change to slightly less wide tyres to ease the problems too.
T Green

i'm running Pannasport 16''x7'' with 205x55x16 on factory BGTV8 with only slight mods to rear guards & no problems, check suspension & all bolts are torqued up to factory specs,Regards Steve
Stephen Foldhazy

16"s? that's interesting. good to know they'll fit under there. do you have them on the front and back or just the back?
jeff

I'm still not convinced by axle offset.
I measured my Heritage shell before I fitted the axle, and both sides seemed the same, fitted the axle and found it was offset 1/2", offset the spring seat on the axle by 1/4" and found it was 1/2" the other way, set the seat back to normal, and found the axle was spot on ! I know it can't be, the only possible conclusions I came to were that a) the springs were not straight(unlikely) or b) there is sufficient play in the axle/'U' bolt mounting to centre the wheels.

Mike
Michael barnfather

Stephen,
I am wondering which offset your wheels are. They are availible in 0 deg and 22 deg I think. I was told the 0 deg was for the 240Z and the 22 deg for the MGB.
Regards,
Mike
mike

I've got 15" wheels with 195/60/15 yokohama tires on them and have no outer lip rubbing problems at all. My Wheels are Konig Diva series from discount tire, http://www.discounttire.com and have a 40mm offset. I DID have problems with the wheels rubbing the bulge on the inside of the rear wheel well where the suspension bump stop is, but I used a BFH to help reduce that problem, and eventually a 1/4" wheel spacer between the brake drum and the wheel itself to move the rims out enough to reduce any chance of rubbing on hard cornering. With that much of an offset (still around 34mm after using the spacer) That gives me about 1/2" more room for a bigger tire under the wheel well and still not have rubbing problems. (215 series anyone?) If I get a chance this weekend, I'll take the car back to discount tire and see if they'll try out a 215 series tire on the rim for me and I'll report back how it works.

Justin

http://www.angelfire.com/mi2/Lithium7/mgb/image5.jpg
(here's a picture of those wheels on the car before I put the cap on the back wheel)

Justin

Justin,
I could not get your image to come up. Can you check and repost if it works? Also let us know about your tire test!
Larry Embrey

Something about this bbs is weird. If you click the link it won't work. If you do a cut and paste into the address bar it works just fine.... go figure.

Here are a few more pictures of the car while we're at it (different views of the wheels and what not)

http://www.angelfire.com/mi2/Lithium7/mgb.html

Don't forget to cut and paste the url!

Justin
Justin

Justin - the 2nd link works fine. The first should do also but for some reason although that URL is displayed in the browser briefly it almost immediately changes to something else. I suspect the site that is being linked to rather than this BB.
Paul Hunt

Justin,
With your wheels, what is the width?
Seems from my previous post I can't remember deg vs mm. Oh well.
Mike
Mike

The wheels are 15" x 6.5" with a 40mm positive offset.

I played around with the picture a little more, and the problem is with angelfire not this bulletin board!

My apologies for the undo criticism.
Justin
Justin

Ok I finally got the car over to discount tire and the guys there were GREAT! We took off a rear wheel and played around and here's what I got: the bulge inside the wheel well for the suspension bump stop really throws a wrench in the gears of a 15" wheel and a 215 series tire. But, an 18" wheel with a 215/35 tire, or a 215/40 tire will fit no prob. The wheel we used to test was an 18" x 7" with a 38mm positive offset and I still had my 1/4" wheel spacer sitting on the lugs when they tried it out. I was able to slide my hand between the tire and the outside lip of the fender so I know there won't be any rubbing problems there. the 38mm offset minus the 1/4" spacer (6.35mm) made for about a 32 mm offset. Ideally, if someone is having an axle shortened, this would be a great time to have an extra 1/4" added to each side so you won't have to use a spacer, and you can use a wheel with up to a 40mm offset and not have any rubbing proboems either inside or out. Honestly, the car didn't look bad with an 18" wheel on it, but that's a whole new discussion....

So there you have it. an 18" rim with a 215/35 tire will fit onto a B without rubbing against the fender.

Justin
Justin

Justin, good to know about hte 18" wheel, did you bounce the car?? turn fronts lock to lock?? make sure it would all clear??

2 things to keep in mind though. a 35 series tire will ride like a gokart, no matter how your suspension is set-up. It will just have no give. It also will throw your speedo completely out of whack which is not new for we V8 folks but something to keep in mind
Larry Embrey

We never bothered trying the wheels up front as there appeared to be more then enough room. And actually, a 215/35 tire won't throw your speedo *that* far out of wack. It's almost the same diameter as a 195/60/15. Technically a 225/35/18 will be the same, but I don't think a 225 is gonna make it under there... I bounced the back around a bit, and there were no clearance issues at all, so a 215/40 should work just dandy. If you want to resolve all of your speedo issues, switch over to a VDO programmable speedo, they're the coolest things since sliced bread! There is cavernous room inside the 18" wheel, so things like the brake caliper and tie rod end will have even more room then previously. I don't turn my tires to full lock while driving, nor after I have just driven because I don't want my rv8 manifolds to melt the tires.

Downside to all that cavernous room: make sure everything LOOKS good in your wheels and suspension!

If anyone wants to actually see the wheels on the car and get a progress report on how well they work, feel free to donate $1600 to me and I'll get them up and going asap ;)

Justin
Justin

heh Justin, All the modern elect speedos are that way. Autometer makes all of thier gauges in mech and elect format now. Only

Why ou pick 195/60r14?? reason I said that is that the stock tire on a B is 175/70r14ish. So if someone had done a conversion keeping stock tires (like I did)and calibrated the speedo, the new tires would throw tht all out of wack...

I would LOVE to get 215 or 225's under the car, heh, thanks for your efforts..

On another note, at our ABFM a guy with a V8 had 1980 280ZX wheels on his car, bolt on 15x6, no rubbing and he had 195 or 205's on it..
Larry Embrey

I did a quick calc on the 215/40r18 wheel and it comes out VERY close to the 175/70r14 tire diam, so should not affect speedo much.. 23.65" stock to 23.93" for the 1215/35's

215/45r16's would be nice.. More sidewall, but still big wheel. handling be good, but ride would be harsh. I head anything under 60 series gets hard...
Larry Embrey

This thread was discussed between 11/07/2002 and 04/08/2002

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