Advice 10x6" or 10x7" rims for use on the road

[Nathan1293]

Hi everyone

I have been very lucky and recently purchased a set of 10" x 6" spectrum split rims. I've always liked them, ever since seeing them on Miglia's in the early 90s. Never thought I'd ever own a set!

Anyway they are currently 10" x 6" but the outer rims are a bit damaged. So as I am replacing them I thought maybe this is a good time to go wider!

I intend to se either Yokohama A008 or A032R tyres.

I'm not super keen on the stretched look for its own sake, but if there is a performance advantage then I'm interested. Maybe 10" x 6.5" is a happy middle ground.

The tyres on the 10 x 6" rims look as though a wider rim would be fine, just maybe not 7" wide?

I've run 10" x 6" revolutions with A008s and loved that setup.

The planned engine is for some serious hp!

If anyone has experience of both setups can you share your experiences?

Cheers

Nathan

I should add this is on my bits a mk1, which is going to be a build focused on fun and performance.

[mk1coopers]

To be honest with you I would say 10x6 is the maximum you want to go, 10x7's with 165 tyres are pushed beyond what is recommended for the tyre width, I've got a car with 10x6's on and it doesn't drive as nicely as cars with 10x4.5 s 4.75's on the road, the only reason they are still on it is because that was what it was built with a long time ago

[mab01uk]

As above I would also advise sticking with 6x10 rims as a maximum for use with 165 road tyres.

The Mini Miglia race tyres are:-
Tyres: Dunlop 160/490 x 10” slicks (dries) or treaded (wets)
Wheels: Any 10” diameter x maximum 7” rims

Photo below of my late brother Steve Bell's Miglia on Dunlop 10" slicks.

[Nathan1293]

The revolutions (10x6") on A008s where much nicer than 165 tyres on 5" wide rims with the same tyre.

I have heard of list of people that suffer from bad bump steer, but that set up didn't suffer at all. I did run quite a lot of caster though. Standard S disc and drum spacing.

It was much more progressive than on the 5" rims and very easy to balance the car when the tyres started sliding.

I've never tried a wider rim before, hence my question for advice.

[Nathan1293]

That's a great photo, and sorry that your brother has passed.

I looked at the spec of the Dunlop slick that the Miglia's use, shown below:

160/490-10 D15 /D42 slick/wet

Optimum rim width 6"
Permitted rim width 5-7"
Diameter 480mm or 18.9"
Overall width 214mm or 8.4"
Tread width 150mm or 5.9"

So the tyre is considerably bigger than a 165 wide tyre. I guess the Miglia's tyre is a cross ply construction as well?

It's a shame there aren't more size choices.

[In the shed]

I had a set of force 7" exactons with 032s on. The stretch makes them less rolley and very nice on a textbook surface, however a road is not a textbook surface and you do not want that much offset.

I went back to keeping 165s within no-arches using D1s/similar. Minilites 4.5 are too narrow for most 165s IMO. Might be OK with avons. But less than ideal.

My whole point of having a mini was to drive like an utter tool. (on a test track and not on the awesome B roads around me). I'd rather have nicer steering and lose a bit of breakaway manners.

Having said, you should be running an ARB before you even think about 7"

[Nathan1293]

Thanks for the sharing your experiences.

Looks like I will stay with a 10x6 size.

Interesting point about the anti-roll bar.

The car was my second mini originally, it was a friends that someone backed into the side and I bought, repaired and used it. (My first car was an 850 mini mot failure that my dad and I restored). Which got turned into a more and more modified toy.

I hope to start working on the toy in the new year, I will start a build thread when the work starts.

The suspension setup that I ran was original 1964 cones (so hard), that a previous owner had lowered. On compression there was approx an inch on clearance between the top arm and the bump stop. 5 degrees caster on the front wheels, reduced amount of toe out (I think on the minimum recommended amount), I didn't optimise the negative camber it was 0 on one side and -0.5 on the other. Rear geometry was 0 degrees camber and 0 degrees toe in. They rear was recommended my the friends dad who had raced a mini gem in the past. I also ran low-ish tyre pressures 24 front, 22psi rear.

The setup worked very well, it did need some more front end grip and a limited slip diff, on country lanes on country lanes the inside tyre would get light and spin. But I learnt to left foot brake to help with this, but that would stress the brakes! boiling brake fluid and blue discs is not good.

The rear was very predictable and the car didn't follow the tramlines very much, also bumps tear wasn't a big problem either. I think we were lucky with the car and wheels used.

I enjoyed the setup a lot, although I had been told tyre was ant least half the effective travel of the car's suspension over bumps.

I agree that the aim would be to have a min for country roads though.

[rich@minispares.com]

The setup worked very well, it did need some more front end grip and a limited slip diff, on country lanes on country lanes the inside tyre would get light and spin. But I learnt to left foot brake to help with this, but that would stress the brakes! boiling brake fluid and blue discs is not good.

.

this car sounds like an utter death trap if your having to stab the brakes to stop the wheel spinning

this just suggests a terrible car set up, and to be honest, probably a accident waiting to happen......................

[Nathan1293]

Lol. No you didn't have to touch the brakes, the car handled very well.

I should caveat this was when I was in my early 20s so felt invincible. Lol. It was also not on every corner, only ones where there was a bump or poor surface. So wasn't a death tramp. But when you regularly run favourite roads, you push harder and find these situations, and long for work arounds.

Every front wheel drive car I've ever driven without an lsd will do this, given enough provocation. Pug306, focus, golf ...

As I know you know if you unweight the inside tyre (hard cornering), and accelerate hard the tyre with least resistance will get all the torque. Which is one of the reasons an lsd is useful.

If you delayed applying the loud peddle or not so aggressively the no problem.

[In the shed]

My first car was a 68 Morris 1000 and I got really confident at chucking it through the lanes. The front wheels always do exactly what they're told. It was really quite fast. I ended up with one with a full race midget engine on a Series 2 back axle and it was hilarious. The midget engine ended up in an A35 with midget brakes/running gear. That handled like a bubble and was like being shot out of a gun accelleration wise.

For fast driving in lanes, I'd go with 5" wheels and 165 tyres and run the suspension quite high, the rear geometry as you say and a RARB to keep the back flat. LSD is a good idea to stop the inside wheel....

Nice

I do regret selling ASBO. Oddly enough, now I am made of money again!

[mk1coopers]

Quaife ATB, KAD ARB =

[mk1]

7" is far too wide for any sensible road setup, personally I wouldn't use 6" on the road either. But if it's stance you are after, its your car.

M

[Nathan1293]

Hi Mark

Stance isn't what I'm after. More performance really. I've never had/driven the 7" wide version, so just seeking advice.

I remember when I first got into minis it seemd everyone had 10" x 7", Bogus, play minis pickup, ...

So just wanted peoples opinion. It seems that this was all about the look even then. I really don't like the look of the over stretched tyre that seems so popular (in the hot hatch brigade).

I think I'll stick to the 6" wide option then.

I like the true sleeper look of narrower wheels and no arches, but not for this project.

My other car is a standard 998 cooper, so have that look covered.

Cheers everyone

Nathan

[mk1]

Hi Nathan,

I hope you weren't offended by my comments, I didn't mean any disrespect.

In the case you describe, less is certainly more. Bump steer is never as bad on 10" as it is on 13" but it still increases the greater the offset. Personally I reckon that if you are using standard road tyres the handling / grip gains using 6" rims over say a 4.5" rim are so minimal as to be insignificant. After that it's all about looks.

Take the App K cars for example, they use CR65 & are limited to 4.5" rims & they put 120+ bhp down on the track quite efficiently.

[Nathan1293]

Hi

No offense taken.

I think that may be true for racing tyres, but some of the road 165 have quite flexible sidewalls. But in realty the difference is probably minimal.

I really liked the feel of the car before on 6" rims, using the A008's. The grip was very progressive and easy to hold a nice four wheel drift. I noticed a difference in feel between the 5" rim, but in terms of grip probably no real difference.

I've never tried the A032R's, but saw a previous topic discussing that one, and for the road I think I'll stick with the A008's first.

Nathan

[mk1]

I switched to 032's from 008's on my Wolseley Hornet & I far prefer the 008's.

[turbocox]

I switched to 032's from 008's on my Wolseley Hornet & I far prefer the 008's.

Having not used the 008's I was wondering if the side wall construction on them was "less stiff" or "more complient" than the 032's




I had some new 032's fitted on the front of the Cox this year and found that the sidewall didn't give at all, which lead to some very scary brown trouser, understeer moments.

So much so, I refitted the old falken's which i had already taken off due to how old they were (circa 2002).
Admittedly they obviously aren't a driven wheel on the front of the Cox, but they need to give a little under corner loading to bite the road.

[nimbusprint]

I switched to 032's from 008's on my Wolseley Hornet & I far prefer the 008's.

Having not used the 008's I was wondering if the side wall construction on them was "less stiff" or "more complient" than the 032's




I had some new 032's fitted on the front of the Cox this year and found that the sidewall didn't give at all, which lead to some very scary brown trouser, understeer moments.

So much so, I refitted the old falken's which i had already taken off due to how old they were (circa 2002).
Admittedly they obviously aren't a driven wheel on the front of the Cox, but they need to give a little under corner loading to bite the road.

Sounds interesting, what did you have on the rears, and what pressures were you running?

[Spitz]

I was using 008 on 5" rims on a track car
I switched to 032 on 6"

...no comparison. The 032 was soooo much better ( not sure if the 6" made a difference. )

I also used the 032 combination on the street, and it is very drivable indeed. The tyre will wear out far quicker than the 008 of course.

[turbocox]

Sounds interesting, what did you have on the rears, and what pressures were you running?

The 032's are awesome on the rear, no problems, but up front where there's no weight over them they just didn't inspire any confidence.

I've always had 6x10's on the car.
I ran falken's no problem for years, with 22>24psi on the rear, and 18>20psi on the front.

I ran the same pressures in the 032's, in the mini your loading it up with weight over them so I assume it's not noticeable how stiff the side walls are.

Imo (which is probably worthless) I think you need the tread surface to tuck under ever so slightly, with the softer sidewall as you load up the tyre, to get that initial turn in bite.