offset range for 15x7 wheel, no fender or wheel well work

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court76wi

New Member
I've read a lot of threads involving wheel sizes and offsets, but most people are talking about lowering their cars quite a bit or using larger 16" wheels. Hopefully someone can help me out. I have a 89 Honda CRX HF that I use for Autocross. Currently I'm running 205/50R15 tires on 99 Civic Si rims (15x6). I have an Eibach Pro Kit so the front is lowered about 1.2" and the rear by about 1" with no camber adjustments. The current wheel/tire combo runs without any rubbing at all.

I want to upgrade to 15x7 wheels with Kumho V710s. I don't want to do any fender rolling or anything else to the wheel well. Does anyone know the offset range I can use effectively when looking for new wheels? I'm getting some conflicting information looking through the forums. If I'm correct, I believe I read somewhere that the 99-00 Civic Si rims have a 45mm offset. So if my clearance is good, I'd like to keep the 45mm offset with the new 15x7 wheels since I'm using the same size tire. Is this correct? Any lower offset than 45mm starts to risk rubbing the fenders?

I attached the best picture I had off hand showing the current rear wheel clearance.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

P.S. The previous owner dumped in a bored D16A6 w/ Gude cam & ECU mod, so it moves pretty good! I did the suspension, ignition, and instrumentation though. I'm outrunning forced induction Miatas in my class with Toyo RA1s. The Miata guys definitely don't like that. J
 

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With the mild drop you have a majority of any 15x7 wheel will work with the size tire you want to use. I would reccomend ROTA wheels or KOING. They both make many lightweight wheels that look good. Most of Konig's wheels are 15x6.5. I had a 88 CRX Hf and had some 15x6.5 konigs w/ 205/50/15 and it never rubbed plus i had a 2 inch drop, no camber kit, and worn out struts. I have a friend who had a 90 Si hatch with a 2.5 drop on coil overs he was running 195/50/15 and it never rubbed. Because of the mild drop you have anything should clear just as long you dont have 90-91 integra rear disk brakes. Just to let you know i am a assit. mgr at a Discount Tire and the location i work at i deal with a lot of civics with custom wheels. I know you are interested in the Kumho tire but Falken makes the rt-615 which is cheaper just as good and will last a little longer. I also would reccomened to have your tires heat cycled. To answer your question 35-40 mm offset is an ideal offset for a 15x7 wheel on your CRX.
 
what would you need to do if you got the rear disc. cuz i'm ordering a set of 15 or 16 slipstreams. what do i need to do
 
The Azenis do not compare at all to a true R compound tire on the track... not one bit.

For a 15x7 and a tire the size of the V710, I would stick with a +40mm to +45mm offset.

FYI, the stock Honda alloys almost all (your 99-00 Si wheels included) have a +45mm offset, so you can compare with that. An extra half inch of wheel on each side with the same size tire will fit perfectly.
 
Thanks for the comments guys. I do have to agree with Calesta, the Azenis are a good tire for ST class variants, but any R-compound tire puts them to shame. The Toyo Proxies are ran last year easily outperformed the Falkens I used to run, and the Toyos are a harder track tire.

I've heard from some other forums that most are recommending a +38 to +40 mm offset. I will report that I did try those +45mm Kosei's. They almost did the ticket. Once I drove my car to let the suspension settle a bit the inside of the rear wheels just barely rubbed against the rear trailing arm. So if you have 6.5" wheels or smaller a +45 mm offset will work, but with 7" you need a little less. The part that sucks is that I checked all the clearances before trying to drive on them, and they appeared to work. So I need to see if I can return them to TireRack.com at all for any credit. Unfortunately, I have some slight paint rubbing on the inside of the wheels, but I wouldn't have noticed the interference without letting the suspension settle by driving on them a bit. So it's a catch-22 regarding wheel fitment.

I'd probably go +42 mm at the most with a 7" rim. But you might still rub just a bit if you rock the suspension a good amount.
 
Oh, I will report that the Kosei's are a very sharp looking wheel. Very good finish and no visual defects at all. Extremely light too. I don't know about some of the other wheels mentioned, but the Kosei's where specifically hub centric for a 56.1 mm center bore, or an older Civic/CRX among other vehicles.

They centered farily snugly around the hubs, and the lug nuts actually pulled them the rest of the way on - especially the fronts, so you definately have a lot of stress taken off the lugs. The front wheels I had rock back and forth about 10 times before the wheels came lose.

Even though I didn't get a chance to race on them, for the $ I don't think you can go wrong for an inexpensive racing wheel. I think they're a bit light for any "hard" street use though. (i.e. don't hit any monster size pot-holes)
 
I attached some pics. Unfortunately once I heard the rubbing sound I imediately pulled back into my garage and took them off. So I don't have a full picture of them on the car.

I checked with TireRack.com, and they can't take any wheels back that show signs of use on them. It is partially my fault since they weren’t listed as an available fit on the CRX with a +45 mm offset – of course they don’t guarantee fit on modified (i.e. lowered cars) either. The thing that pissed me off is that when I called back they said they had notes from the saleman that the wheels might interfere with the rear trailing arms. Which he never bothered to mention.

So even though they still couldn't give me my money back they said they'd give me 25% off a new set of wheels if I wanted to purchase some. That was actually too good of a deal to pass up considering. So I have +38 Kosei's coming in their place. With the discount on these wheels, and if I can sell the other ones locally or on eBay I'll probably only be down $100 - $150. Which isn't too bad considering. I could of complained some more but it wouldn't have gone any futher. The new +38 wheels need centering rings though since these are more apt for other cars (Mazda's an so forth). I did make sure to specify aluminum spacer rings though.

My car is kind of a piece compared to most people's vehicles, but its function is more important than it's form. The previous owner was a Tech College student that was building himself a little drag car. It's a CRX HF with the Si motor and transmission dumped in it. He did really great powertrain and exhaust work on it. Forged pistions, rods, crank, Gude racing cam w/ ECU good up to 8200 RPM. HPT bolts. Timing is set for 93 octane gasoline. New header with custom 3" stainless exhaust minus cat converter. Magnaflow on the exit. I did some more engine work regarding the intake, ignition, grounding, oil pressure gauge, shift light etc. The car's suspension was shot though. New Koni yellows all around. Eibach Pro-Kit. Upper and lower braces both front and rear. ST 7/8" swaybar front and 7/8" adjustable rear. Si discs on the front with Hawk pads, Std drums rear. Poly bushings where applicable, plus more junk not worth mentioning. Manual stearing and cluch, and no A/C, so besides the fact that I could rip the interior out it's as light as it's going to get. SM2 class. I should clean up the Miata's this year with the V710s.
 

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