Wheel weights

Danny · Postby **Danny** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 5:53 pm

Curious to know what wheel and tyre weights are out there.

I've got 2 sets of 17x7. One's got 205x40x17 and the other 215x40x17. Both come in at 16 kilos. No idea what the separate rim and tyre weights would be.

Anybody else got their weights? Be interesting to know given our cars are supposed to be sensitive to unsprung weight.

Postby **NitroDann** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 6:02 pm

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=wheel+weights

Crapweasel · Postby **Crapweasel** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 7:35 pm

Thanks Dann! :lol:

Tumbles · Postby **Tumbles** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 11:20 pm

http://www.miata.net/faq/wheel_weights.html

http://www.good-win-racing.com/Mazda-Pe ... heels.html

Enjoy the links. I found them most helpful.

Also, find a wheel you like and Google it. Probably best to look into Enkei RPF1 and 949 Racing 6UL just because they're the usual lightweight suspects.

I'm getting Enkei 92 15x7 4x100 +38 soon and they're 6.21kg each.

Danny · Postby **Danny** » Fri Mar 21, 2014 1:29 pm

6.21 seems quite light. What effects have people noticed with wheel weights on the road and/or track with MX5's. Also there doesn't seem to be a comprehensive site with tyre weights. 1kg saved on the wheel could be gained with a heavier tyre. Does a 17in tyre with say a 40% profile weigh less or more than the same width but say 50% on a 15in wheel?

On other cars I've had I've always felt the steering to be sharper and more sensitive as the profile got lower.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Fri Mar 21, 2014 1:56 pm

http://mx5cartalk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=748818#p748818 I tried to get a wheel/rim weight thread started but...

hks_kansei · Postby **hks_kansei** » Fri Mar 21, 2014 2:07 pm

A change in width, diameter, or offset, will make more of a difference to steering feel than a kg here and there ever will.

On a racetrack lighter wheels may be worth a tiny bit of time, but I would also suggest that tiny bit is vastly outweighed by the margin of error in non-professional drivers.

On the street, well being able to save a tenth of a second really makes no difference if right after that you have to stop at a light etc.

What I'm getting at is, while there is a slight difference, it's not night and day.
I would put money down that if you did a double blind test with pretty much anybody on the forums, they wouldn't pick a difference on the road.

chrons_rotary · Postby **chrons_rotary** » Sat Mar 22, 2014 12:28 am

Bought a set of these, so light and look similar to 6ULs. Ran great so far.
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/141142569888

Tumbles · Postby **Tumbles** » Wed Apr 09, 2014 1:39 am

dvr wrote:6.21 seems quite light. What effects have people noticed with wheel weights on the road and/or track with MX5's. Also there doesn't seem to be a comprehensive site with tyre weights. 1kg saved on the wheel could be gained with a heavier tyre. Does a 17in tyre with say a 40% profile weigh less or more than the same width but say 50% on a 15in wheel?

On other cars I've had I've always felt the steering to be sharper and more sensitive as the profile got lower.

I've also found the bumps and road quality to be more evident as the profile got lower.

Wheels arrived yesterday. Everyone talks about small differences, but I'm quite sure it'll be night and day for me; I'm currently running wire spoke wheels and I'm going to be happy going back(?) to a more conventional design.