Need specific winter tire / rim advice. I'm completely ignorant!
 

Hey guys, I'm basically here begging for help because I'm by far the most ignorant and uninformed person on the face of the earth when it comes to purchasing new tires.

I thought I had about a month left to deal with this, but here in Minnesota we just got our first snow fall of the year ALREADY! It usually doesn't snow until mid December these days.

So I need new winter tires for my 370. From my understanding, it's going to be a lot easier on me (and the stock summer tires) if I just get a complete new set of rims along with the tires. So that's what I'm looking to do unless I get other advice.

I've read through the past couple months worth of posts, and although there are a few suggestions such as "get blizzaks" or "blizzaks suck, get alpins" and the like, I still don't know what I specifically need. My main problem is that I see a lot of numbers thrown around, but I honestly don't know what a lot of them mean.

The biggest concern I have is buying tires that won't fit over the sports package brakes, because that seems to be the problem other people encounter.

Here's my level of understanding:

I have the sports package, so I understand I have 19" tires and very large brakes and will need to find tires that fit around them.

I understand that narrower tires are better in the winter for obvious reasons.

I also understand the basic difference between summer / all season / winter tires and why they are better for certain conditions.

Beyond this, treat me as though I was your grandma (unless your grandma knows about tires, in which case she definitely knows more than me!) and knew nothing, because that's basically where I'm at.

There's a lot of very general information out there, but no specifics. If anyone could provide specific links to websites selling tires / rims that will definitely work, I'd greatly appreciate it. Or even list out the specific rims/tires that you yourself have purchased for your sport package 370Z for winter driving.

Price is a concern, but just getting these and being done with it is a bigger concern.

Basically, what would you buy in this situation?

I greatly appreciate any response.

I think 18 inch rims would fit, but it would be good to have someone confirm it for sure. The g37 sedan with sport package has 18 inch and i think it has the exact same calipers and rotors as the z. 18 inch would be better because of a greater variety of available snow tires at cheaper prices.

18 will fit. but you need the right wheel. need to confirm it will pass the caliper. i got ones on my G that fit. but I am not home to lok up the wheel i bought.

You find try to find someone selling the 370z 18" wheels because those will fit (other countries only get the 18" wheels and have the upgrade brakes).

Ok, so the standard 18" wheels will fit over the sport brake upgrade? Sounds good.

But like I said, I'm a complete newbie here. So I'd basically just take the standard 18" rims, then go out and buy whatever 18" winter tires I wanted? How do I make sure that the tire fits on the 18" rims? Intuitively, it seems to me like the 18" rims would be too wide to properly accomodate a thinner winter tire. Am I wrong?

Again, I really appreciate the help but I could use some specifics here because hopefully you can see how little I know about this stuff lol :)

I have been evaluating this as well. Tire Rack sells wheel and tire packages, I think I will likely do this once I can confirm the 18-inch winter rims that I am looking at will clear the sport package brakes.

The more I think about it, this seems like the easiest route to take. The tires will come mounted and balanced on the wheels, and they even have an option to add the TPMS. So when the time comes, I am thinking:

1. I can have these shipped to my house.
2. Swap out the wheels in my driveway.
3. Store my regular/summer wheels & tires in the garage.
4. Drive to the nearest local, trusted auto service place to do an alignment.
5. ????
6. Profit!

Seriously, this will likely cost me somewhere around $2,000 or so, unless someone comes up with a much cheaper option.

I've also considered getting a winter beater and garaging the 370Z for the winter, but I think this is likely a much larger headache. Even though the beater option virtually guarantees that I won't get the Z dirty, stuck, or God-forbid into a weather related accident, there's not too many reliable and acceptable looking cars in this price range. Also, I think I can throw fun to drive right out of the window as well.

I have the Base/Touring model and mounted some Blizzaks from the local Big-O Tire store on the stock 18" rims (got mine powdercoated). They're ready to go when the snow comes.

http://www.the370z.com/members/schru...intershoes.jpg

The 18" Base model rims are a bit narrower than the 19" Sport rims so if you can get your hands on a set of these rims some narrower winter tires will fit great.

I went with the stock Base tire sizes (225 in front, 245 in rear). My Z is my daily driver but the wife drives a 4x4 SUV so on bad snow days I'll be carpooling with her.

You could also go with 225's all around if you want a little better snow traction, the 1" wider rear base rims will still handle 225's just fine.

I wanted to keep some stagger (wider rear tires) to maintain handling and performance on the non-snow days during the winter.

The tires were about $800 (tirerack.com had them on clearance, Big-O matched their price) and base rims seem to go for $1000 and up, so the $2000 figure quoted above is right on.

Shrute gives good advice. That's exactly what I'm doing as well (I too have the sport). So I had to buy a set of base rims from someone who was upgrading his car to bigger rims (Thanks Jason!)

Base rims are front: 18" x 8.0" with 43mm offset and rear are: 18" x 9.0" with 15mm offset
Base stock tires are 225/50-18 front and 245/45-18 rear

I ordered a set of Blizzak LM-60's in the stock sizes for $781 delivered to Connecticut from Tire Rack. Had to pay sales tax cuz they now have a warehouse in CT (damn!).

This was about the ONLY fitment that Tire Rack has right now. It may be scare tactics, but the word is that tire manufacturers cut back on snow tire production this year because of the recession, reduced car sales, and predictions that more people would put off buying snows. In other words, there is NOT much stock available, so for rare sizes, you are better off buying your snows sooner rather than waiting.

As others have said, you do have other options. If you can get a set of 18" x 8.00" wheels that will fit over the sport brakes, you could mount 225/45-18" tires all around, and that would perhaps be a bit better for optimum deep snow traction.

another less-good option would be to fit a 235/40-18" all around, on the base wheels. These tires technically would fit. For instance, looking at the Michelin site, they offer the Pilot Alpin PA2 in that size, which is a really good snow tire. That tire is designed for 8.5" wide wheels, but its fitment is recommended for wheels between 8.0" to 9.5" so it technically fits. But if you think about it, the sidewall flex will be different when compressed slightly to mount on the 8.0" wheels versus stretched slightly to mount on the 9.0" wheels. This will affect handling, and is not recommended.

My recommendation would be to pick up the base wheels and buy snows in the base sizes which unfortunately means one brand, one type, and not a lot of tires in stock.

Hope this helps!

HJM

I bought Blizzak LM-25s to fit my sport 19" rims. We'll see how they do, but I imagine it will be just fine.

Tirerack finally have 18" winter options posted on their web site for the 370 w/ sport pkg . I'll be running 18x8 w/ 225-50-18 all around for winter on a dedicated wheel/tire set.

Before I found out about the tirerack update I already had a test fit scheduled next week with my local installer for the 18" Sport Edition A7 wheels. Now I know these will fit but with all the other 18" options available I'm now thinking of switching for the MSW Type 11 (machine w/ black accent). The tires will be Toyo Garit KX.

if you are going 18" rims. do not go blizzack. they suck. go pilot aplin sport. Michelins are the best. drove last winter on the LM-25's man hey do not hold a candle to the alpins. I have bought alpins to replace the lm-25's. they suck.

18'' msw type 2 is what i have, they clear the bbk's and got it off tire rack

^^^^ mine look better then his.

Why do you need an alignment? just to change tires?
Also, pretty sure your TPMS sensors on the new tires will not work out of the box, Dealer will most likely have to sync them to the car.

Do you mean Type 11? I'm looking at the 5-star patterned rims, I think they look halfway decent, but they are winter tires, I am not so much concerned that they are beautiful wheels as much as a functional set of wheels that lets me get around in inclimate weather better than the 19" Bridgestones. Good to know that these clear the bbks, that's the info I was looking for.

Regarding the alignment, I always thought new tires required realignment. Given that the car is brand new, I may be able to forgo this step. As fgar as the TPMS, I'll stop by the dealer and have them calibrate it if I have to.