Sometimes it's hard being young at this modding game... Since I rarely know what I want, and listening and seeing all the slick Gs here, I always seem to get lost in the mix.

In taking somebody advice who suppose to have 20 years in the game told me that this setup with give me more handling ability: 245 35 20 Front and 275 30 20 Rear. Now my G is all over the place with no where near the handling I was use too. While taking my normal curve on my well travelled road to work, at about 70-75 in the far left lane on a 2-lane curve, I had to break it down considerably, and almost lost it ended up in the right lane. I was shocked. 70-75? Are you serious.. I could not take this curve at a mere 70? I have taking this same curve at 80+ in my winter tires which are OEM size Advantas (spelling that wrong) very easily. WTF: These suppose to be high performance summer tires (Nitto N555 Extreme on some TSW Snetterton Chrome wheel)- I thought bigger tires would put more rubber on the road, and thus better traction. Man, I'm so tired of experiencing everything I got to go through.

Anybody using this setup? The rides sucks for agressive driving for me anyway. What are my options here to obtain better handling? Would spacers improve the handling? Thanks for any advice..

 

Well anytime you get larger wheels with thinner tires your going to lose some handling. 20" is a pretty large rim. I'm not surprised you say the ride sucks, I hear that all the time when people upgrade to larger wheels. Are you lowered?

 

Was it understeering a lot, or what? Assuming that your OEM wheels/tires was a square setup, going to a staggered setup with wider tires in the rear would give you a larger contact patch in the rear. That essentially means you would have more grip in the rear than the front (relative to what you had before) which could cause understeer. However, I'd be surprised if that really lead to such a noticeable (and negative) difference in handling.

The other thing I would say is to get the car aligned. If you bought new, wider and larger diameter wheels, the offset will be different and could potentially affect handling. I don't think that would necessarily throw off your alignment, but it's possible that's somethings up with new wheels.

What wheels did you get and what's the offset?

 

i run that set up.. my car handles like it's on rails.. the stock set up was horrible.. even before i lowered the car with coilovers, it handled 50% better than stock with THAT set up....

 

^ What he said.
I have those same tires but in 245/35/20 and 255/35/20 and have had no problems with handling or traction. How is your alignment? Is the tire pressure good?

 

I bet the tires are over inflated. Check them cold and let some air out if they are over 36 PSI. If they are seriously o-i they will ride and handle like crap. I've seen installers put tires on a G and pumping them up to 50. Not a good thing.

 

Thats my thought as well.
OP, check the recommended tire pressure in the door jam and ajust from there. Since the tires are wider than stock you can lower the pressure slightly. With the wider footprint the pressure is spread out further, thus requiring less tire pressure.

 

The recommended tire pressure on the door reads 35 PSI and like Tim mentioned you're probably over inflated. The installers at my tire store think I should run 40 PSI in my 19s....wrong! Then there's the weight of those fat azz 20" rims, the weight and size isn't conducive with ride or handling. Some times we all make bad/incorrect choices....
Gary

 

Dudes, you guys are tight, so much helpful info - just knowing that some of you guys run the same setup makes me feel better already. The ride doesn't sucks, the handling is very different from what I was use too. But after your inputs, I started to realize where I might have panic a little, and took it a little faster than normal. After taking the curve again, I was able to handle it a lot better.

My setup is 275 30 20 offset 10 and 245 35 20 offset 8.5 Nitto Extreme N555 - I'm going take a look at that pressure tomorrow. I just installed some new DPA 4000 rotors, Hawk pads, and asked the guy to re-torque my lugs and re-check the balancing. He also checked the pressure, but probably set to standard. I was considering lowering, but working in DC makes me nervous about lowering. Also, sometimes I park in a underground garage that scare the hell out of me. If I did, it wouldn't be much... I really appreciate you guys! Thanks all you guys have been so helpful as always.

 

Thats what we are all here for...to help one another and to learn more about our cars.

 

Ahem ... I'm surprised no one has mentioned that new tires need a few hundred miles to get the releasing agent off of them. They can be very "slick" feeling when new.

 

Another possibility for sure.^^

 

Fadil, you can't assume some tire jocky is going to set your tire pressure correctly....you need to tell them what pressure you want. Like I posted previously my guy thinks I should run 40 PSI which is at least 3 LBS too high and makes a difference how my coupe rides/handles!
Gary

 

Man, you ain't never lying...FD40 RD39 FP37 RP39 - The dude that checked my tires must have been on crack. Damn, I can't trust anybody - these guys have been working on my cars for years, and always done great work. The mechanics are good, but they must hire anybody to change/fix tires. Damn tire pressure was all over the place... Haven't driven it since lowering the pressure to 35...hopefully this will make my handling a lot better..

You're also right about breaking in the tires - even before I changed the pressure the ride had gotten a little better.. Again, you guys have come through - once I get my body kit installed, and the body cleaned up from all the rock chips etc., I'm going post some pics... To be honest, I'm a little leary to post, after some of the Gs I've seen here. I've got a lot of more work to do before I feel comfortable enough to post, but it's getting there.. Being a noob at this, just the changes I've made this year alone have me giggling inside like a teenage boy at a strip club.. I'm very proud of what you guys have done to my G. Thanks again. You guys are Tight!

 

I just posted this in another thread. There's truth in them there words.