you are right on the money there...mine looked awful without the drop...18s are the cutoff of looking stupid without a drop

 

i agree with that idea.........

 

Hey everyone, thanks for the advice!

I decided to go with the OEMs!


Only $380 for 4 wheels and tires. Already ordered some H&R spacers for the rear

 

good choice.

 

 

I heard spacers are bad for the suspension, is that true?

 

There has been some debate about spacers. These are the facts
1. Spacers change the geometry of the suspension.
2. Spacers add another component that could potentially fail in the suspension.

The significance of this is hard to determine. By pushing the wheels out you are increasing stress to other components of the suspension, so I suspect some parts will wear faster, how much is anyone's guess. You would be doing the same thing by getting aftermarket rims with a more aggressive offset. There are many people using spacers with out any problems.

I plan on eventually getting new shocks, springs, and anti-roll bars so if things wear a bit quicker, I'll have new suspension quicker

 

I've had my Maxima for about 3 years, and I have always ran spacers on the car. The longest setup that I have had was: 8mm in the front and 13mm in the rear. There were no problems at all. It changed the offset from +35 to +27 (8 inch wide) in the front and +22 (9 inch wide) in the rear. After I have turned it back to stock, everything is still in tip top shape.

The most important thing to remember is: always buy quality parts for your car. If you cheap out at the beginning, you will be paying to fix the problems those cheaps parts usually cause later on.

 

I was thinking of getting 20mm or 30mm hub-centric spacers. they are the most expensive ones like $300 for a pair. I'll get the longest possible ones, I don't know exactly if it's 20 or 30 mm, but I've heard something around there.

 

For some reason I decided to take pictures today, in the pouring rain

17" OEM 5 spokes and H&R 25mm spacers on the rear. New tires and a nice balance has made the steering much nicer, with less vibration. I noticed a HUGE decrease in body roll going from 16" snow tires to 17" Performance tires. No change in ride quality. I'm sure the spacers are helping as well. I'm very happy with it.

**note: passenger front tire is on a bump making the front wheel well gap larger.

 

i hope you got hubcentric spacers .
and where did you find that price for a set of tires+wheels for OEM 17s?

 

The spacers are from H&R and are most definitely hubcentric. In fact they initially refused to put spacers on the car. The manager called the owner of the shop and he said if they were H&R they were fine

I got the tires+wheels from the classified section of CL

 

I have an 02 GS300, and was looking for the same thing as you,. Some better looking but not too blingy rims. I saw a gs400 with the exact same wheels you ended up getting. Please fill in a noob, why do you need spacers at all for the rear?

 

If you look at your car as is, you'll notice that the rear wheels look sunken when compared to the front. This IMHO makes an already droopy rear look even more so. The spacers push the wheels out closer to the fender. The 25mm push the rear wheels out to where the fronts are.

Benefits
1. It looks a lot better/agressive, and with these wheels retain an OEM look
2. Decreases over-steer (or fishtailing).
3. Increases stability during turning

 

but also keep in mind it screws up the original suspension geometry.