22 replies to this topic

[Dusky]

Hi peeps!

 

Some questions! ;)

 

Im going back to original with my mini. And now I came to the wheel decision.

Atm I got the standard wheels with bad tyres in the garage, and I got my 'normal' minilites on it.

 

my questions : 

- Will 145/70 tyres fit my minilites? ( I got 165/60 on them atm)

- Any advantage on alloy vs steel wheels?

- And how imprtant are wheels in terms of originality? I would need to find an extra hubcap though.

 

THanks

 

Dusky :)

[jaydee]

145s will be fine as long as the rims are not exceeding 5" width

[timmy850]

145 tyres are fine on 4.5" wheels. Do you know the width of your minilites?

Having recently swapped to alloys from 4.5x10 steels I've noticed they are significantly lighter. This helps with acceleration, direction changes in steering and the ride has improved too. My steel wheels had problems with inner tubes too, as most shops won't fit tubeless tyres to wheels that don't have a safety bead on them.

Wheels are one of the easiest things to change on a car and can make it look significantly different! People have been swapping mini wheels for wider and different styles since the 60's, so I wouldn't see any problem having a car on a set of period style wheels..

[Anthony30]

Yes, the standard size for 12*4.5 Rover minilite wheels is 145/70R12. I take it you have 165/60R12 Yoko A539's on ATM?

[Dusky]

145 tyres are fine on 4.5" wheels. Do you know the width of your minilites?

Having recently swapped to alloys from 4.5x10 steels I've noticed they are significantly lighter. This helps with acceleration, direction changes in steering and the ride has improved too. My steel wheels had problems with inner tubes too, as most shops won't fit tubeless tyres to wheels that don't have a safety bead on them.

Wheels are one of the easiest things to change on a car and can make it look significantly different! People have been swapping mini wheels for wider and different styles since the 60's, so I wouldn't see any problem having a car on a set of period style wheels..

 

 

Yes, the standard size for 12*4.5 Rover minilite wheels is 145/70R12. I take it you have 165/60R12 Yoko A539's on ATM?

Sadly no yoko's Dunlop SP Sport ( probably 20 years old orso? )

 

DOn't know wich size they are actually, these are some pic ( maybe one of you recognises it?

They should be original..

 

on the car : 

[Anthony30]

 The size should be on the sidewall of the tyre.

[Dusky]

 The size should be on the sidewall of the tyre.

Its 165/60 atm, but I wonder if I can get 145/70 on it, wich would be nicer to have imo..

[Anthony30]

If you want to be sure of the wheel size, look on the back/inside of the wheel, it should say 12*4.5, for example.

[Dusky]

On the back I found ' PWC'
'4N11A' 'CH' H.T' '10301 xxx'
And eventually '4.5B X12 X 35'
Dont know where the rest of the nummers stands for lol

[AVV IT]

Have you ever driven a mini on 145/70's? If so, then you must know what you're getting yourself into, so that's ok. If not though, then I'd be very warey of swapping to them. In my experience they're terrible, and make it handle like a completely different car. My Sprite came with them and having driven far better handling minis in my youth, I thought there must be something wrong with the cars suspension. It turns out the suspension was absolutlry fine, it was just that it had 145/70's on it! A quick swap to 165/60's and it handled like a mini again, I wouldn't go back to 145/70's if my life depended on it!

I realise you're just trying to go back to standard spec, but unless you're a concourse purist, then sacrificing the handling for the sake of such a minor detail just isn't worth doing in my opinion.



EDIT: & before Cooperman starts, by the term "Handling" I do actually mean "Road Holding", it's just that if I use the technicaly correct terminology, then only the anoraks seem to get what I'm talking about!

[Cooperman]

The 145 width tyre was standard on all 12" wheeled Minis.

If you get a good 145 tyre it will be fine. The handling is about the best of any Mini tyre as is the wet road-holding. Dry road-holding may not be quite as good as with a 165, but you would have to be driving on the 'ragged edge to notice the difference.

I drove a 1997 MPI with new 145/70 x 12 Falkens in the wet a while back and thought it was fantastic. It was really like driving an original Cooper 'S' in terms of the way it felt through the steering. In the dry it was good too.

[Dusky]

I've never driven with the 145/70 tyres.
Are they really that bad? I would use them on the 'not do slow 998 I have )

[AVV IT]

I guess it's gonna come down to a matter of opinion, but in my experience they're awful. Like I mentioned above, so bad I actually thought there was a serious problem with the suspension. Put it this way, if the 165's hadn't improved things I was planning on selling the car. I guess if you've never driven a mini on anything else, then they're probably ok, but I'd spent my youth driving mini's around on fat 10's though, so the difference between the two was significant.

[Cooperman]

All the rallies won by the Cooper and Cooper 'S' back in the 60's were won on 145 section tyres except where full racing tyres were used, which was rarely.

They are fine and are better in the wet than an equivalent 165. They also handle better in all conditions, but there is a bit less road-holding in the dry.

To a great extent it is down to tyre quality. Crap 145's are as bad as crap 165's.

[timmy850]

On the back I found ' PWC'
'4N11A' 'CH' H.T' '10301 xxx'
And eventually '4.5B X12 X 35'
Dont know where the rest of the nummers stands for lol

That means 4.5" wide, 12" diameter and offset of +35.

I don't see any reason why you'd put 145 tyres on when you could have a set of A008 Yokos. Unless of course you have 3.5" wide steels and nothing else will fit that is!