Yea, I know, another 'which wheel' thread...

Well here's my position.. I run 20" TSW Vortex rims with Nitto 555's. They are ok an' all but I was never really sold on 20" wheels from the start. They look great from some angles and not so great from others, you know.So then I picked up a set of GT500 take-offs for poncing round on.

While I don't like the GT500 rims themselves, I think the car looks much more cosmetically balanced with 18's on, so that's what I'm looking at.

Ordinarily I wouldn't be asking for advice on cosmetics as it's such a personal opinion type of deal, but here's where my choices become problematic.

I run the Gran Turismo Brembo brakes on the front, which is essentially the same caliper [kinda] as the GT500. This caliper is a real Fat-Boy and 95% of aftermarket rims won't clear them, which is why I went for the GT500 rims. Most all of the tire/rim stores online and who which have the lookup-you-car system on their sites do not include the GT500, which is ridiculous as the rim requirements are totally different to the GT.

So, I'm looking for an 18" rim, which won't break the bank, and which fits the GT500.
I reiterate, these rims have to fit the GT500 which is NOT the same as the GT.

So, any guys out here with a GT500 or with GT500 brakes and aftermarket rims? What you got, how much coin and did you need wheel spacers ?

I'm starting to lean toward the TSW Thruxton, seems there is a large amount of clearance.

 

Big brakes are getting more common. A lot more wheels fit than you think, such as all the shelby wheels. Also, a lot of the new TSWs having big brake clearance. I'm ordering the new TSW Nurburgring wheels, which will clear brembo 4-pots.

 

its all in the offset of the wheels....

when looking up wheels, itll tell you what the offset is....

ull need an offset that is the around same as the gt500 wheels which is 45mm....

what u can do is call a ford dealer and talk to the parts department and ask them what is the lowest offset wheel u can get and still fit them on a gt500 and they should have that info at hand....

 

you mean highest offset. a lower offset will generally have more room on the backside.

really what you need to know is the highest offset you can run, and the minumum backspacing. FWIW, you can run as low as about 35 offset in the rear on a 9.5 without rubbing a 275 tires. I'm running 29 offset on mine with no rubbing in the rear. I'm still working on my front end fitment.

 

yes u are right, my mistake :-)

 

Actually in this case it's about the design more than anything. The offset value is the position of the rim band in relation to the hub face. Well, there's no measurement for the way the rim design cuts in or out. This is exactly where rim resellers go wrong when they arbitrarily say their rims will fit. I've had three wasted trips to high street wheel vendors who said they had "Plenty" of rims with the correct offset and that their rims will 100% clear the calipers only to discover none of them do............

 

Marcus, I can't tell for sure in the picture but are those TSW black chrome?
If so, be careful as the quality isn't a sure thing...
You don't want to get into a nightmare like people experienced with the POS GodSpeed rims.

 

Thanks for the tip Pascal !

 

Marcus,

You could always go for a set of the 2010 GT500 Replicas over at American Muscle. They have them in 18" and now 19". They state they now clear big brakes also!

Sean

 

You're welcome because nothing was ever done towards members that got the shaft on this ordeal.