Todd

Wife's needing new tires soon. On an older RX300 I ran the Michelin Cross Terrains and was very happy. Firm side wall, low noise, excellent wet traction. However the closest size to my OEM 235 55 18 is the above mentioned size, 235 65 18.

Has anyone tried the Cross Terrain on the 330? What are the implications of running a 65 versus a 55?

Todd

bump................................................

jfelbab

You'd have problems.

When your speedometer shows 60mph your actual speed would be 64mph.

There is not enough clearance for a tire this tall. It would rub against the suspension. That tire would be about an inch and a quarter taller. Look at how much room you have above the tire now.

CK6Speed

iTrader: (1)

I personally wouldn't run that tall a side wall. 65 series side wall would be pretty tall. As for fitting, I believe they will physically fit. I ran 255/50/20 on my 04 RX330 and it just fit. My set up has a 30" over all diameter, and it appears a 235/65/18 also has a 30" over all diameter. Again, I wouldn't run a 65 series tire though. As for speed, my speedometer read 60 MPG when my car was going 62-63 MPH according to my GPS. Personally, I wouldn't worry about that myself, but others might.

JasDmw

I'm just shopping for a second set of wheels/tires. Picked up a set of tire pressure sensors at my local dealer last week and talked at length with a mechanic about wheel/tire sizes. He stated that anything outside of 3% bigger/smaller than factory sizes may affect a lot more than the speedo. We have a bunch of sensors for ABS, traction contol, skid control, etc. that would be out of whack should the 3% tolerance be exceeded. Just check a web site for tire size comparison. Not sure if this is allowed, but a link to my favorite is below.

http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

Enter your factory size in the left set of boxes and your new size in the right.

Note that the 17's on my RX are 65 series. This number represents the ratio of tread width and sidewall; i.e., 65 = 65% of the sidewall height is tread width, I believe.

Chpsk8

Here's another good link with info regarding tire sizes. Similar to the miata.net one, but a little more data.

http://www.net-comber.com/tirecalc.html

jfelbab

Another one, my favorite tire calc site.

http://www.rims-n-tires.com/info_specs.jsp