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Who is running 18's or larger wheels on your 65 or 66 (Pics)?

9K views 47 replies 20 participants last post by  Nos681 
#1 ·
I am having MTF mini-tubs installed in my 65 FB and am starting the research for new wheels/tires. I will have the original rear in the car so will be trying to get the backspace correct that will give me the widest wheel/tire setup I can put in there without rubbing...including while doing hard cornering :). I know I want to go with at least 18's but also interested to see other combinations that might be larger than that.
 
#3 ·
^ agreed. I put 17x8's on my '66 I just built, 245 tires. I ended up dropping to 7's in the front, and the 245's still rub bad. I'll probably end up replacing the tires with 235's or even 225's for clearance. I did the Shelby drop in the front, and have a narrowed explorer rear end in this one.
745529
 
#16 ·
What backspacing? For future reference. Rear link?
It's been so long to remember exactly. From what I can recall is that the rear wheel was a 6.72" BS. I had the rear end built to accept the large BS - with each side .5" wider than stock.
The fronts were 18x9 originally as I liked the deep dish. I had them narrowed on the inside making them 18x7.5". The BS ended up being around 3.75"

The rear is a TCP 4 link but I had to re-engineer slighly to take advantage of the mini-tub. I moved the trailing arms inboard and the shocks outboard.
 
#23 ·
For us old timers the large rims do not like good on a vintage muscle car. Some of the really big ones just look plain stupid and its not because I'm old and out of touch. It draws your attention to the wheels and not the overall balance of the entire car. The size of the wheel-wells were designed to look good with a 15-inch rim and a tire with some sidewall. Probably because that was the biggest rims available.at the time. Cruising during the 1970s you did not see "any" rims larger then 15-inch on a Mustang, NEVER. If you went into a speed shop there were no rims larger than 15-inch on display, maybe they were available but I never saw them. I'm such a muscle car "purist" that my brain cannot accept those large rims on a Mustang or any muscle car. All of my "old" friends say the same thing. I won't even walk over to look at a muscle car with giant rims. It makes me think that this person doesn't understand what muscles cars are all about. Just remember the guys that have the money to buy your cars when you are ready to sell them are probably old and they want something old-school looking. If you wait another 20-year's we will all be dead and then it won't matter
 
#25 ·
For us old timers the large rims do not like good on a vintage muscle car. Some of the really big ones just look plain stupid and its not because I'm old and out of touch. It draws your attention to the wheels and not the overall balance of the entire car. The size of the wheel-wells were designed to look good with a 15-inch rim and a tire with some sidewall. Probably because that was the biggest rims available.at the time...
It's my understanding that tire technology was the biggest driver when it came to wheel/tire availability. With radials and shorter sidewalls came bigger wheels.

I hear where you're coming from and respect that position. I personally liked both and ran my car with 14's for 20+ years. That said, with that newer tire tech comes expanded possibilities and shifting tastes. These days, if a wheel/tire combo doesn't fill out the wheel opening more, it just doesn't look as good.

I like my 17's much more than my old 14's.



 
#33 ·
17" wheels will fit a 65/66 no problem. You just need to make sure you have the correct or close backspacing on the wheel itself. It might limit you to running a smaller sized tire up front but a 215/45/17 worked for me. I believe it also depends on your brake setup, whether you've got drums or discs and I've heard discs stick out further than drums and essentially push the wheel/tire out further toward the fender. I tried 16's on my car and yeah, they rubbed like crazy on the UCA's.
 
#40 ·
To clear the ball joint and run up to 6” backspacing you need dropped spindles and 18” wheels. The steering arm also gets moved slightly so it also sits inboard of the wheel lip:



Even at 6” backspace you’ll start to run into the framerail/inner apron at full lock.

I will be ordering the Maier dropped spindles soon in hopes of running a square 18x9 5 5/8” backspace setup all the way around. If I get crazy and funds allow, I’ll flare the wheel wells I will go 18x11.

This is a performance thing not a park at Dairy Queen beauty pageant thing. I built my car to go to the track. If you think you’re going to compete with the big boys at a high profile Cam T event with your 225/60r16 Walmart tires you got another thing coming. Not to mention not being able to fit big brakes.

Enjoy your ‘vintage’ rubber, boys. I’ll be busy trying to make my car faster at the track.
 
#47 ·
745781

This is clearance I had with following combo:
Wheels Enkei 18x7.5 w/5.75bs. (1” wheel spacer used)
235/40/18 Pirelli...run narrow at 9” wide
78 Granada spindles
1” Arning/Shelby drop
Stock type upper and lower control arms...no modifications at all
Fenders not rolled...front or rear
Stock strut rods w/ poly bushings
KYB GAS A JUST all 4 corners
1 1/8” front sway bar
5 leaf mid-eye rear springs
620 springs in front
 
#48 ·
Seven washers = .4050”

Six washers = .3475”

just for reference, I measured them so I knew what I had before my winter modifications.

As mentioned earlier, you can make slight changes to upper control arm to gain more clearance too.
This winter I made some changes to same stock upper control arms.
I can easily run 5” of backspacing on the fronts.
I haven’t spent time yet, but I can probably go up to 5.25” bs...or darn close.
 
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