So I have my 08 Impreza and I am going to be putting my 16 snows that are same size from the bmw i had on it. In the summer/spring i would like to get a set of 18" BBS rims for it. Tirerack seems to recommend 45 or 50 offset wheels. 18x8 if that matters.
The wheels that I really would like to put on it are 18x8.5 30mm offset. Can I use spacers to install these wheel onto my car.
I don’t quite understand how spacers and offsets work.
So yeah, but going with less offset you’re moving the entire wheel closer to the fender/caliper/suspension and could get rub.
That being said I think a spacer would fix it.
A spacer is just a plate of a specified thickness you slap on the hub before the wheel that, as the name suggests, spaces the rim out from the car.
I’d wait for the wheel experts to chime in though.
The problem is, the offset calculation gets thrown off because you are moving to a much wider wheel than the stock size since the offset measurement is taken from the centerline of the wheel width. 6.5" is the stock width for your Imprezza wheel, right?
So, a 50mm offset on a 6.5" wheel may stick out less than a 40mm offset on a 8.5" wide rim (I don’t feel like doing the conversion from inches to mm).
I had a 17x7 Konig Tantrums on my GSX with a 42mm offset. I moved to an Enkie RPM2 17x8 with a 35mm offset and the wheels stuck out further than with the larger offset 17x7.
if you are going from an 8" +45 wheel to a 8.5" +30 wheel you wheel will be about 21mm further street side.
i have never owned a subaru but on most cars there is plenty of room to go further street side and lower.
offset -15mm streetside and the extra half inch of width / 2 (half on inside half on outside) 25.4mm in an inch / 1 = 12.7mm / 2 6.35mm… there is probably some more math here what with the width and offset changing but this will be close.
adding a spacer will put you further into the fender so it wont help you, it will hurt you.
adding negative cambe will help you clear your fenders, but on a subaru i dont know how much camber people like to run… on a 240 the more the better.
Rx3 Thank you for being so informative in my thread which was a very similar question.
As JayS told me earlier on aim … just buy the damn rims meant for the car. People there seem to strongly advise against doing what I want to do even though it ca be done.
To quote the thread “Just because it fits does not mean it is right” yea I will stick with what tirerack tells me although I may try to find a used set of either BBS RX or RGR since they are rather expensive rims. Sigh BBS CH would have looked so hot too.