What Size Tires ???

[brbluesman]

Ok, I'm old school. I like the funny car look on my daily driver - the wide, almost slicks on the back and the small dragster wheels on the front. Now I also like a clean look so I bought a set of 15's (4) Keystone Klassic 32's for my 74 SE. Now I want to put tires on them and get a somewhat large tire rear, small tire front look going. Does anyone know the widest tire I can safetly put on a 6.5" wide rim ? And the opposite, what is the narrowist tire I can put on the 6.5" rim ? I've tried the tire calculators but I haven't found one that can tell me what I'm really looking for.

[Nacho-RT74]

I think you can go 275/60 on rear ( will fit more than "tight" ) and 205/75 in front if want to keep close to same diameter. ( fronts being around 1" smaller )

the hardest part wil be try to find a matched set/brand/model of tires on those sizes

BF Goodrich could make a "good" matched combo 255/60-15 with 215/70-15 and all white lettering, being all 4 corners around 27" diameter

195/60 15 in front wil be also available from Goodrich, but overall 24" diameter

215s are available also in 65 and 60, maiking allmost 1" less on each selection

255/70 is an option too on rear but 29" diameter...

everyone seems to accept 6.5". 255/60 says 7 min, but I have used them on stock steel rims 6" for yeeears without problem ( on Dunlop )

I allways search on tirerack website for all this kind of info. never have bought to them, but the website provides good info and tables for this

[brbluesman]

Thanks, Nacho, for pointing me in the right direction. I can't wait to get the new tires and rims on the car. Working on interior this weekend then next weekend will be the wheels.

[Nacho-RT74]

I'm not a Tire expert, I'm just forwarding you what I read.

For a more "dragster look" would need wider rims on rear. In your shoes, to get what you want, I was select 6" in front and 8" on rear to keep a street car with that look

[brbluesman]

I bought the rims when I bought the car so I've had them awhile, but I just checked and found that I gave the wrong size. They are 15 x 7's. Will the 255/60R15 and 215/70R15's still work ?
And with rear being 60's and front 70's, will it make the rear a little higher than the front or visa versa ?

[Nacho-RT74]

60 and 70 is the % of the width the height will be. Those numbers are relative not absolute

for example 60% of 255 ( which are milimeters ) means the height is 153 mm ( thats the wall height )

70 % of 215 = 150.5 mm

that means the diff will be almost unnoticeable on height... just 1/4 of inch maybe in total, depending of rim width, which can make the tire wall more or less vertical to make that difference exact.

[brbluesman]

Ok, I see. Now the 255's say the tread width is 9.1" where the 215's are 6.5" so I'm assuming the rears will be almost 3" wider than the fronts ?

[Nacho-RT74]

actually my converter says 255=10.03937 and 215=8.464567, dunno why the diff between table and what maths says

40 mms diff are around 1 inch and a half

[brbluesman]

Way cool ! That's just the look I want. Now if I could get the rear end a little higher than the front...

[Nacho-RT74]

just edited my earlier post...

you can get it higher with 255/70


www.tirerack.com/tires/tires.jsp?tireMake=BFGoodrich&tireModel=Radial+T%2FA&partnum=56SR5RADTARWL2V2&vehicleSearch=false&fromCompare1=yes&tab=Specs

255/60-15s are not on table below because they are selected on top...