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What 16in Wheels and Snow Tires for 08 T&C LTD ?
I need extra 16in steel wheels and snow tires on my LTD to go up a hill. 17in wheels and performance (why) snows (!) are very expensive. Tire Rack sells a 16in pkg with 09 Dodge Journey wheels and 225/70-16 Firestone Winterforce for $736 +$200 ship to MA. The bolt pattern is the same at 5 x 123mm. Is the offset the same and the fit the same ? They do not sell 16in steel wheels for 08 and 09 T&C. Maybe I should buy used 16in wheels and make my own pkg? Will the 4 low pressure warnings show w.o. sensors? Thanks
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The Goodyear Ultra Grip Ice, Bridgestone Blizzak, and Michelin X-Ice2 all offer outstanding winter traction. I have a set of the UGI on my Forester, and other than a bit of a harrowing moment a couple days ago when I was taking a 50 mph corner at 65 between a sedan on the right and a tractor-trailer on the left (coming the other way) while driving on slush (oops), the roads have not even felt slick with those tires: They are incredible.
On my Forester, the UGI's are 215/65R16 (mounted on a steel wheel), with the stock tires being 225/55R17 (mounted on an alloy).
But properly done a move as you suggested will not result in any speedometer error.
I suggest you go to Tire Rack's or Discount Tire's we site and do your reserach there. Those folks have measured the clearances and know what fits - and what doesn't. The folks at vehicle dealerships will not. They deal with replacing stock parts and can help you find the proper stock part for your car, but won't be able to help you with modifications. After all, they deal with tens of thousands of parts - by part number - for the vehicles their dealership sells - not the one-off modifed vehicle. You'll have to figure that part out yourself.
More effective may be to reduce rolling resistance of the tire by reducing the friction with the road. You can do this by going with a skinnier tire (say a 205 vs. a 215) or increasing the pressure in the tire.
The '99, as with all similar and more recent model years uses a 5x114.3 bolt pattern with a 71.5 mm center bore. For alloy rims, an offset of 40mm is, I believe, stock. The last I looked, Tire rack showed compatible rims with offsets of 35-40mm, but I never ended up putting alloys on my van and have stock steel rims (15") on it.
If the stock tire size is 215/65/R16, a smaller tire of 205/70/R16 will keep your calibration within 1.1%, a larger size of 215/70/R16 will put it off by 3%. If you go with 215/65/R17, you will be off by 3.6% and will likely increase your rolling mass because the rims are typically the heaviest part of the wheel/tire equation (which means more effort to get it moving and more stress on the suspension). But, that is the largest tire amongst these mentioned and it is only 1" larger in diameter than the stock tire, so any of them are going to physically fit on the van.
To summarize:
215/65/R16 rotations/mile: 747 calibration 100% speedometer reading at 60mph: 60
215/65/R17 rotations/mile: 720 calibration 96.4% speedometer reading at 60mph: 57.86
215/70/R16 rotations/mile: 724 calibration 97.0% speedometer reading at 60mph: 58.18
205/70/R16 rotations/mile: 739 calibration 98.9% speedometer reading at 60mph: 59.35
Now, if you want to go with a 17" rim for the sake of it, a 215/60/R17 tire is an excellent match, at 99.4% calibration.
Going up in rim diameter, and making the proportional changes so that the load carrying capacity and overall diameter are the same - a process commonly called "Plus Sizing" - makes for a wider, heavier tire and rim assembly.
The loss in fuel economy is partially due to the extra weight that has to be accelerated (and slowed down) and partially because of the larger amount of tread rubber being deflected.
BTW, it is NOT the friction with the road surface that causes rolling resistance in a tire. It's a property called hysteresis. Another way to look at it is the internal friction of the rubber - and since most of the tire - particularly the part the is most involved with deflection - is the tread rubber, this dominates the rolling resistance picture. So more would be worse - meaning wider, deeper, etc.
But the single most dominant factor in rolling resistance is the rubber itself. You can get HUGE differences between tires that are otherwise identical just by changing the tread rubber. Unfortunately, this comes at the sacrifice of treadwear and/or traction.
Plus upsizing tends to put you into lower profiles - and this direction tends to go for traction by sacrificng treadwear (and RR).
So your best bet is to stick with the current size and search out tires that have the best combination of the properties you want.
After capriceracer's fantastic post, this is likely a moot point, but keep in mind that it is not the rim size that determines the number of rotations, it is the final diameter of the assembly, which is primarily determined by the tire size. For example, I can have a 17" rim and a 16" rim, with 225/55 tires on the first and 225/60 tires on the second, and the rotations per mile are nearly identical (754 versus 757). With a difference of 0.006%, do you really expect noticeable change in fuel economy if all other factors are equal? If I wanted to change the diameter significantly, I could simply put 225/75 tires on the 16" rims and I would have nine percent fewer rotations per mile (689 vs 757); the rim size remains the same - it is the tires that change the overall diameter.