Originally Posted by buddhi

Twenties are too large, 19s are perfect. Vors VR8 rims with 235/35/19 & 245/35/19.
I need to lower the front by a centimeter. That will be the 24th time I've pulled,
adjusted, and put back a wheel trying to get the ride height perfect.

Originally Posted by GmanSC

I’m not a fan of large rims nor black rims. Sorry.

Originally Posted by buddhi

Rules for Wheels:

Twenties are too large, 19's are perfect. I have Vors VR8 rims (with 235/35/19 &
245/35/19), cheap, about $260/each. I had to replace the original 245/45/19s
front and rear tires that rubbed and looked way too big. Made it look like an
off-road racer.

I need to lower the front by 5 mm. That will be the 24th time I've pulled,
adjusted, and put back a wheel trying to get the ride height perfect.

Regarding rims and the four possible rims from above, I am a rim snob, and I hope
you are too. Most rims look terrible, usually due to the lack of artistic sensibility of
the buyer - the rims both don't fit the car and are usually ugly. Best is a rim color
that matches the car color, which gives continuity. Do you really want the rims to
overpower the car? Imagine a garish ring setting that overpowers a tiny diamond.
19-inch is what everyone needs, anything less or more is "off" and tells the world
your judgment can't be trusted. And please no sorry excuses like, "I know what I
like" and "it's in the eye of the beholder." No it's not.

Black wheels on a black car is tough, they don't often work. Ends up looking like
too much black down there, but not always. The best rims have not much space
between the spokes like the expensive Mercedes wheels. They are high quality
and look it. They never try too hard like 99% of after-market wheels.

The original SC pancake wheels have that quality look but they blew it by being
too small and not pushed out. Same with the older GS wheels. These cars come
alive with larger wheels. This may be Japanese modesty; they deliberately
sabotage perfection as if bowing their head in modesty, like the pottery that has
a deliberate imperfection to bring it down to earth. Kintsugi is the word for "more
beautiful for having been broken."

Do not show off your brakes. No one wants to see your brakes. Do not paint them
red, that's just stupid. "OMG! Brakes!" What you want is a multi-spoke wheel,
minimum ten spokes, or the spider web wheel like I have where you can somewhat
see through but not too much. Or else classic chrome Cragars or classic Chevy
Rally wheels, chrome on black Porsche Fuch wheels, or old classic five flat-spoke
Ferrari wheels, or authentic wires with knock-offs (bad for a torquey V8).

Don't try to reinvent the wheel - stick with the classics, or the generalized ironclad
rules: there should be more spoke than space and it should be concave. Also
the spaces should be of equivalent volume. Choice one above essentially meets
that criteria but two and three do not at all. The spokes and spaces are not right
and the perimeter rivets are unevenly spaced. Looks terrible! The Versus wheels
are good except the silver needs to be black and the rivets should be pushed out
to the outer rim and kept silver or the wheel looks too small. The expensive real
three-piece wheels have real bolt heads around the perimeter - I'd never get them
because they're countersunk and look corroded when the holes accumulate dirt.

Your wheels must not show too much behind the rim so keep the gaps between
the spokes small. The spider-style wheel below keeps the spaces even and of
equal volume. Wheels should be concave, not convex, which looks cheap. The
rims need to be medium deep dish, not to much, and not shallow. Add interest
with the 3-piece rivet or nut design or they'll be boring like the 49 out of 50 wheel
mistakes you see. Don't buy wheels because you like them, but because the car
likes them. See them on the same color car and learn from other's mistakes. Do
some work on the center cap - make it plain, no logo - and keep the lug nuts plain,
possibly with extensions to make them even with the center cap. Don't be ridiculous
with contrasting lug nuts.

Therefore, rim selection number one from above is the best, except you need
to paint the deep dish and lip black to match the rest. The silver lip as-is will
make that wheel appear as a tiny 16-incher. Cheap knock-off rim designs are
best or your life will degrade each time you curb them.

It is rare to see a good looking wheel/car combination, as it's mostly due to luck.
I consider rims the major make or break expense that almost everyone gets wrong.
My car got it right, but that was just luck, even though I think I know what I am doing.
For that reason a perfect car/rim combination should be cheered and celebrated as
something special. I always compliment a guy who gets it right.

Once you get your rims down it is time to now spend however many thousands of
hours on the stance or all will be lost.

Originally Posted by oldcruizy

Great post. What do you think of these options?


Nice and clean, classic like the sc430. Bit expensive (AUD). I'd need to add 10mm spacer is that right?

There's also something along these lines, probably wouldn't go with Alibaba but could work.



and these



any general advice? I agree with you on 19" being the sweet spot and wanting multi spoke or wire. Is it good to get wider rear wheel or extra cost for minimal value? I like the idea of wider rear wheel though there's a good YouTube vid where he talks about one of the secrets to keeping sc430 maintained easily is sticking to oem specs.

sc430 is a beautiful car, closest a man of my means will get to experiencing the French Riviera of the 50s.

Originally Posted by buddhi

Number two looks superior to me - jewel-like but not overdone, and inexpensive, too. It looks evenly well balanced, for visual composition. The other two are also very good, can't go wrong with them. Maybe three over number one. One is a bit plain, since no rim nuts, but still not bad at all. Wouldn't want the Speedy center cap on number three.

BMW does rear offset so I guess that's the best way to go, a 20 mm differential is common. I have 255 rear and 245 front and the 255 look perfect for the SC rear. Messed up once and put the 255 on the front, handled fine but felt noticeably lighter on turn-in when I got the 245s back on the front. An embarrassing mistake and I had the sizes reversed for half a year. Will get new tires soon and likely go with 275 and 255 (front) primarily because the new Pirelli ultra performance all-weathers are rated superior to my current Continental Extremes but I am concerned that the new 275 size, which is half an inch wider, will look too wide for the SC. Will do it anyway because the new tire technology is better on handling, road noise, and tire wear, though not much.

The guy's reasoning for factory spec offsets has merit as stock is always the preferred default (unless the reasoning behind stock is saving production cost); he assumes the engineers designed for no offset but I wonder if there would be any significant increased maintenance. It's certainly possible since I could feel what seemed like excess weight on the front when I had 255's up there. More concerning, it might throw off handling at the limit. It's not just the non-stock width of the tire but also the added unsprung weight affecting both handling and maintenance. I'd stick with my current 255/245 if the new Pirellis came in that width.