17" or 18" wheels with factory sports suspension

[ahalibut]

I've searched the thread, e-mailed TireRack.com, e-mailed my local Infiniti dealer and even e-mailed Infiniti corporate themselves but can't find the answer...

I have an '05 G35 coupe with the factory sports-suspension (19" wheels). I'm wanting to go smaller, 17" or 18" wheels for the winter and possibly for the track since 17" and 18" tires are more readily available and much much cheaper than 19".

Is this possible? Looking on tirerack.com or tires.com only shows 19" wheels as an available option. TireRack.com's customer service initially said that there were 17" and 18" wheels available for my car, but then I made sure he understood I have 19" factory wheels and they haven't replied again. Infiniti customer service hasn't replied to my query.

Thanks.

[Kao1]

G's come with 17's,18's and 19's.

[Texasscout]

I can't believe you didn't get an answer to this.


Yes It can be done. You just need to work backwards. I went from 18" to 19" wheels, yet I kept the same rolling diameter for my tires (no speedo problems).

Go here: http://www.wheelsmaster.com/rt_specs.jsp

Plug in your tire and wheel size you have now and get the stats below in the box. Then plug in 18" or 17" rims and find a tire size that gives you the same diameter as you have now. It will even tell you how far your speedo will be off.

[ahalibut]

The reason I didn't want to assume is I know the G35 is tuned at the factory to look for a staggered set up for the VDC and TPMS. My best guess as to why I can't find a "wheel shopping wizard" that will show me 17" and 18" wheels, like tirerack.com and tires.com, is that they know the car, if it's looking for 19" wheels, will not accept smaller. I've read other places that indicate putting the same size 17" wheels on a factory sport-suspension G35 will retard these electronic monitors. I went further with this, figuring the electronics were so specific as to require 19x8 wheels in front and 19x8.5 wheels in rear. Just my overthinking it?

[neal@tirerack]

17's and 18's will work perfectly fine on the car. Very common to do this for winter setups. Our Upgrade Garage only shows oe or larger, the Winter Tire/Wheel selector will show you the minus sizing options. We put them there as it's mainly a seasonal option than year round for most people. Follow the ymm selector in the hyperlink above and you'll see what's available.

[redlude97]

If you want to run a stagger set of 17's on a coupe, go 225/50/17 and 235/50/17 or 225/50/17 and 225/55/17. Some people have had luck running 225/55/17 all around on a coupe without VDC issues but YMMV