Suspension, Brakes, Drivetrain discuss the wondrous effects of boost and your miata...
Sponsored by:
Sponsored by:

Wheel offset and handling/scrub radius

Thread Tools
 
Search this Thread
 
Old 11-20-2009, 09:58 PM
  #1  
Elite Member
Thread Starter
iTrader: (4)
 
MartinezA92's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Redwood City, CA
Posts: 1,784
Total Cats: 42
Default Wheel offset and handling/scrub radius

I searched offset and scrub radius here and didn't really find much.
I'm looking at some wheels locally that are 20 offset. I'm sitting on shitty daisies right now. I know changing offset affects scrub radius and what not and could affect handling, I just don't know in what way exactly. Would anyone advise not to run a 20 offset, and if so, why?
MartinezA92 is offline  
Old 11-20-2009, 10:51 PM
  #2  
Tour de Franzia
iTrader: (6)
 
hustler's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Republic of Dallas
Posts: 29,085
Total Cats: 375
Default

Originally Posted by MartinezA92
I searched offset and scrub radius here and didn't really find much.
I'm looking at some wheels locally that are 20 offset. I'm sitting on shitty daisies right now. I know changing offset affects scrub radius and what not and could affect handling, I just don't know in what way exactly. Would anyone advise not to run a 20 offset, and if so, why?
Its really complicated, but think of scrub as a literal tire scrubbing. When you have 0-scrub, then you turn right, the left side of the tire gets cleaned. If you had a scrub even to the inside edge of the tire, the complete tire is "scrubbed" or cleaned. This gets more complicated when you consider steering-axis-inclination.

There's an incredibly sensitive balance between spring-rate, damper force, camber, and offset. Scrub-radius changes have huge affects on handlobraesing and there's a reason Emilio made his wheels 36 or 40mm offset and has specific camber recommendations. This is the reason why my car won't turn worth a **** on the 99 wheels, and with the 6ULs it feels like a totally different car.

I suspect that if you went with a 20mm offset you'd have to run very-little camber to get "effective" scrub, and then when you loaded up the tire on turn-in there would be so little camber that contact patch would drop so low that you'll wish you had a 36mm offset. The Miata has pretty good suspension geometry, I wouldn't change it unless you have a badass calculator and an accelerometer because every concept in suspension is dynamic and you're screwed if you put that ricer crap on your car.
hustler is offline  
Old 11-21-2009, 12:55 PM
  #3  
Junior Member
 
mtbgael's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2007
Posts: 61
Total Cats: 0
Default

Interesting. This past autocross season I ran 13x8s 0 offset with 225/45/13 Hoosier A6s at local events, and 13x9 32 offset with the same tire for National events. I set the car up around the 9s, and every time after when I ran the 8s it felt like CRAP. I thought wheel width/ tire age was to blame, but I guess the offset could have been the primary culprit.

When I'm running the 9s I have to run a 1/4" spacer to clear the rear control arms and front brake calipers (the previous 32et accounts for this). I did this to keep the rear of the car as narrow as possible for increased slalom/transitional speed. IYO should I run a larger spacer to increase my track a bit in the front, or even front and rear? Do you think my grip would go up (specifically front end grip, I just set the rear to work around a max'd out front)?
mtbgael is offline  
Old 11-21-2009, 09:37 PM
  #4  
Elite Member
Thread Starter
iTrader: (4)
 
MartinezA92's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Redwood City, CA
Posts: 1,784
Total Cats: 42
Default

Ehh, I thought so, I'm gonna pass til I find normal offset. Which is 36 right?
MartinezA92 is offline  
Related Topics
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
Full_Tilt_Boogie
Build Threads
84
04-12-2021 04:21 PM
emilio700
Wheels and Tires
151
06-02-2017 02:36 PM
mx592
Suspension, Brakes, Drivetrain
1
10-01-2015 12:45 AM
Vtpalom1
Miata parts for sale/trade
4
09-28-2015 11:05 PM



Quick Reply: Wheel offset and handling/scrub radius



All times are GMT -4. The time now is 05:27 AM.