Hello S2ki wheel and tire experts..

I will try to give you the necessary information up front to best facilitate the delivery of your wisdom and guidance:

I recently inherited a 2004 Honda S2000 Ap2 from my mother for an early graduation present! The car is a theft salvage (was stolen/stripped in Washington) and was rebuilt in San Francisco. Unfortunately, likely due to the naivete of my mother, the rebuilder threw on some random 16 inch rims. As I know, the 2004+ s2000s come with 17s...

For the several years that this car has been in the family, we have problem with what sounds like the rear left tire (and sometimes the rear right) rubbing. The sound occurs only during a distinct bump in the road that jarringly compresses the rear suspenion. The car is bone stock suspension wise. We have taken it to the Honda dealership several times and they have never found anything wrong suspension wise. This problem has occurred with several different tire brands. I was thinking it could be due to an incorrect tire size on the rears...

I will provide you with the current tire sizes and brands which need replacement ASAP. I am not looking to get new rims yet, so please guide me towards tire sizes that would fit with my existing mystery rims.

My current tires:

Front = 205-55-16 (Kuhmo Ecsta ASX All Season..)
Rear = 225-50-16 (Kuhmo Ecsta ASX All Season...)
Rims = unknown width, made my "MB Motoring" (I cannot find them online anywhere)


And alas, my question:

What tire size(s) should I be considering for my set up?

 

Those are actually the correct tire sizes for 16" wheels. My guess is you are rubbing because of the wheel offset. If you aren't familiar with offset, it basically determines where the wheel sits within the fender. If you replace a 8.5" +65 stock wheel with a 8.5" +45 wheel, it will stick out 20mm. Since the wheel sticks out further than stock, the fender contacts the tire when the suspension is compressed, otherwise it is fine.

I know Discount/America's Tire carry MB Motoring. They are a cheap wheel but have a couple decent looking options, 2 of the most popular being the 5 spoke "Competition" and 7 spoke "Weapon".

There are couple ways to fix the rubbing:

Roll or trim the rear fender lip on the inside
Run more negative camber (UK spec is -2 rear).
Sell wheels and look for OEM 17".

 

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/587727/10

Here is a pic of the car with the MB Motoring wheels. Any chance someone knows the offset by memory or something?

1nate7: Thank you so much for your prompt response. I'm going to evaluate these options very soon.

 

Those actually look decent for 16", it is the 747 which has been discontinued so I can't find a size chart for it. My guess would be around 7" +40. A pic down the side of the car so we can see how flush the wheels are to the body would help estimate the offset. You should be able to get a good idea of the width just by measuring it, sometimes the specs are stamped on the inside of the wheel.

 

is it me or does that actually look slightly lower than stock height?

 

It should be the OEM height, all the suspension is from the original car. So the consensus is that I should just go ahead with the OEM ap1 16" tire sizes?

 

That's what I'd do, in addition to getting an alignment with more negative camber. UK alignment is -1* front, -2* rear camber, that should work fine, or you can run a bit more more if you like. Just keep the toe reasonable (zero front, toward the smaller end of the spec range for the rear).

 

Welcome.

Here are your wheels.

http://www.wheelsbymbmotoring.com/product.php?wheel=747


From what I can tell they were only made in a 16x7, which means you need new wheels ASAP.

 

Wiggum: thanks so much, I guess I can't call them "mystery" anymore at this point.