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my lovely wife has an audi (A3 sportback 8V) and I was planning to get her some spare wheels with winter tyres fitted (conti 850 probably)
A large retailer of such delights has a size-finder on its website and when I choose from the options I come to a spec sheet that says, amongst other things:
Special features
bend wheel arch lip front axle,
flare wheel covering front axle,
wheel covering front axle,
wheel covering rear axle
emailed them and got this:
bend wheel arch lip front axle - requires rebuilding of the rim of the wheel on the front axle
flare wheel covering front axle - requires widening of the inner panel of the car (which means the wheel needs more space)
wheel covering front axle & wheel covering rear axle - hard to state what exactly the author had in mind... means also some kinds of rebuilding of the wheel panel
Can that even remotely be correct and if so - WTF !!
sounds like you have chosen a size that is too big ..
Alternatively just buy some all season tyres on the current rims and use them for all seasons? Not like negotiating deep drifts is a regular necessity is it?
Basically means it's an aftermarket wheel to the wrong offsets and size for your/wife's car.
maybe, my point is that it's their "finder" that offers them up (and why are they implying that they might be useable by allowing it to pop up)
(tyres are same size as the ones on it right now; wheels, not sure - clearly same diameter)
oh, and I can't find a published offset for the 8V 2012+ cars - does anyone happen to know ?
Ring your main dealer and get an emailed quote. That should then have the correct size of everything you need. You can then use this info to compare. Main dealers are always worth a try for tyres. They're not always automatically the most expensive for everything.
maybe find a website that doesn't spout nonsense? 🙂
"requires rebuilding of the rim of the wheel on the front axle" FFS....
Camskill are pretty good for tyres I always find, that's where I`ll be getting my Conti Winters from shortly
I take it this is off a german website? Have you used mytyres steel wheel & snow tyre builder wizard thingy [url= http://www.mytyres.co.uk/cgi-bin/skw.pl?dsco=110&cart_id=35338543.110.22294&s_p=Steel_wheels ]clicky[/url]?
Always go for steelies with winters, or if you must use alloys ensure they have hammer-on weights as the glue-on ones get water behind them , which freezes and then fall off overnight. You can also bash out a steel rim with an adjuster following the inevitable over-enthusiastic off.
All season tyres are junk. A marketing ploy by american manufacturers.
oh and all those options above are for fitting larger diameter wheels - so if you wen for a set of 18x9j bling wheels you'd have to have the front and rear arches rolled to make em fit.
Funnily enough it was mytyres that threw up these comments (on their alloy wheel wizard as the steel one wasn't working - is now though 😕 )
their steel wheel options are 46 or 48mm offset - numbnut's expertly found link suggests OEM is 51 so I imagine the 48 at least would be OK
Funnily, the steel wheel thing doesn't have a "special features" section at all - I'd be more reassured if there was a section and it said "none"
Thanks folks
should mention, this is southern Hampshire - winter tyres arguably pointless but although she really hates the occasional snow she still goes out to work, probably screaming all the way (she taught the kids a new vocabulary by repetition on a 10 mile drive in slush once 😀 )
You can probably get oem steelies from vag for a sensible price. I got an oem alloy for my old 406 for sub £100 from a main dealer a few years back. Then source tyres from wherever at least then they will fit right! Must cars have a little tolerance on offset and you can get spacers.
You may also need different wheel bolts.
Thanks
I'm pretty much sorted I think - mytyres does have appropriate wheels, it's just that they don't default to them (now that I've found the ET/offset for a 8V from numbnut's link it's possible to find the right sizes)
Ebay is your answer for a set of base 16 rims.. Then mount your rubber