L8 APEKS

Hey guys,

I may have found a good deal on some "rice wheels." Let's just keep it at that.

I'm wondering...who may carry adapters to make these fit should I decide to try them out? These would become my street wheels, and the PD's would don dedicated track rubber.

Also...I wouldn't need a spacer since these should already stick out more than stock, right? My ride heighth is currently stock, but I've been considering Intrax or similar springs (~1.5").

Thanks in advance!

Matt H

You could probably get away with the offset but the spacers would have to be custom made and I really dont think that is terribly safe with a car that has a 350 coming and I have seen you mention track time.

Out of curiosity, if you are going to spend the 8-14K to make the 350 conversion work, why care about a 500 dollar set of wheels vs. a 1K dollar set of wheels that would fit, be right for the car and have a wider rear wheel for more tire?
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L8 APEKS

Well, first of all, it costs NOWHERE near 14k to put a 350 into the 944! That's about 200% what my total cost is, and I could do it cheaper if I felt like being more resourceful. I'm just lazy and I am buying pre-fabbed parts which are costing MUCH more.

At any rate...the swap will not go through for quite a while now. I think work is going to be moving me around later this year so I don't want to leave a driveway ornament blocking a valuable parking space for months on end! I am putting the stock engine back together in the next month or so, and I recently thought it might be better to drive the S for a while, then SELL this car complete and buy an 85.5 that needs work to do the swap in. I may feel guilty butchering the S. lol. And since it will have a zero-mile motor, the resale should be good.

Anywho, I digress. These wheels would be street only (daily driving purposes), and I would be using the stock PD's for all track events. I just feel like trying them out because the price is right, and I have a feeling they might look pretty good. Of course, they may end up looking like hell...but I won't know unless I try!

Now, with the spacer deal...isn't my stock offset something like 52 or 54? So a 44 would cause the wheel to stick out more, right? That's my main concern. Assuming I find adapters (I've been told they exist, I just need to find them), I am worried that the adapter PLUS the 44 offset may run the wheels to wide to fit the fenders. How much room for error is under there? I've seen some pretty large wheels on 944's but I don't know how much fender rolling was involved!

Thanks for your input!

Matt H

On a 7" wheel this is irrelevant. 10mm is about .3 inches and with a 7" wheel there will be plenty of room.

As to the other, talk to a number of people who have done the conversion. If you need info from the board, the people to ask are Predator (I think he has done more than one) and dmsog. Both of them have a good grasp of what it takes. I dont like the conversions but I am not going to argue about them.
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L8 APEKS

Ok, so it should fit then? Excellent. I may not end up with them, but they are cheap and would allow me to wrap some race rubber on the PD's. I won't find a more affordable set of wheels, so I wanted to jump at the chance. But I'm 3rd in line for them, so we'll see what happens.

As for the 350...yes, you CAN theoretically spend far more. But I have done all the research, talked with a few people driving around in them, and been in touch with the guys at Renegade. Truth be told, you can do a clean, solid conversion for under $6k if you play your cards right, do your homework, and are willing to do a little legwork yourself.

Case in point...you can spend $2,000 on just their radiator + wire harness/ECU modification. Then I found a $220 radiator that works just fine, and a place to do the wiring/ECU for $200 bucks. There is absolutely no reason to approach the $15k mark unless money is simply no object and you enjoy paying 350% markup to get the same results.

But I don't want to talk 350's because it depresses me knowing i won't be able to do it until next year, and I'm only going to have about ~200hp to keep me happy until then. That's part of the reason I wanted the wheels...to help get my mind off of the engine stuff. lol.

Matt H

Any concern with passing CA inspection, certainly I would think there would be with the visual :>)

I dont know see how you can do it for that little unless you are using a used engine.
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L8 APEKS

Of course it's a used engine! If it ain't broke, why would I fix it?! Used motors with warranty and all accessories sans trans can be found for 1000-1500!!!

tifosiman

Here's some food for thought. If you want to use your phonedials for track events, you will have to remove the bolt-on spacers/adapters (necessary to make those non-spec wheels fit) every time you want to run the phonedials. This in itself is a pain in the butt. I would recommend that you find some wheels with at least the proper bolt pattern. IMHO, YMMV.

Skip

Porsche bolt pattern is 5x130.

5x114.3 is a popular import pattern.

EDIT: oops, pulled trigger too fast - I see you already knew that.