I'm looking to get the 18" Brabus Monoblock IV rims. What tire would be best suited for all around driving?

I don't want too low profile. I'm not planning on lowering my car. I just want to put on these tires on and have it fill up the space. Will I have to roll the fenders?

for 18" wheels, your options are either 245/40/18 all the way around or 245/4018 up front and 275/35/18 rear if you have wider wheels in the rear. Changing the tires sizes, you have to make sure you keep the overal rolling size the same, or you throw off your ABS, speedometer, ESP and other electronic devices.

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Chirag (Charlie) Patel

99 Mercedes-Benx ML 430 V8 w/custom TV, Video, UHF, speaker system
93 190E 2.6 w/ an amp, equalizer, and CD-changer, integrated w. stock stereo for integrated cellular phone speaker system
2001 C-Class - Maybe

Brabus recommends 225/40-18 to 235/40-18 for the front. 245/40-18 will also fit because the E55 uses that size. However, after calculating the rolling diameter, 235/40-18 is almost perfect -- there's only a +.0748 of an inch increase. The 245's will increase +.38976 of an inch.

As for the rears, Brabus recommends 225/40-18 to 265/35-18. Again, the E55 uses 275/35-18. For your E430, the 275's will increase by +.25197 of an inch. The ideal staggered size would be 265/35-18 with a slight decrease of -.023620 of an inch. I hope this helps.

Eric

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'00 E430 w/ Solaris H-7's
Brabus 19'' Monoblock V, 2 piece
H&R Sport Springs

'99 SLK230 Sport

Unfortunately, what a calculated tire size equlas and what size a manufacturer priduces end up being different sometimes.

Example__________________Calc.____Actual
Stock E320 215/55/16_____25.31_____25.4
E430 Sport 235/45/17_____25.33_____25.4
265/40/17________________25.35_____25.5
225/40/18________________25.09_____25.2
235/40/18________________25.40_____25.5
245/40/18 (E55 front)____25.72_____25.7
265/35/18________________25.30_____25.1
275/35/18________________25.58_____25.6

For my example of actual sizes, I used Pirelli because there sizes are easily found on the web.

Also remember, that If you measure the error between the rear wheels size (instead of 25.4, it is 25.6) you will see its less then 1% which means if you are cruizing at exactly 100 mph according to your speedometer, you are actually going 99.2 mph instead of 100 mph. This error is so small, it is close to a perfect match. The bigger size on the front wheel isn't really going to have much impact due to the fact that the drive wheels are the rear ones.

Also, things like ESP and ABS measure difference in wheel rotation to find the speed and to sense if a car is slipping or that the breaks or locked up. these systems turn on when they usually find about a 20% difference that is unaccountable, less then 1% is not going to cause this to malfuction with the car's computer system. Most car's can not even tell the difference between a +/- 0.4 inch change in radius.

Another benefit with going with wider is you put more rubber down, which gives a better contact patch to the road. Also, the bigger a tire, the more load it can carry, this usually isn't a problem, but when it comes time to corenering, and all the weight shifts to one side of the vehicle, this is when maximum cornerning capabilities become pushed to their limits. This combined with a low profile tire allows less flexing of the side walls givving the best performance possible. All that is left is the tire make and model to pick in that size.

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Chirag (Charlie) Patel

99 Mercedes-Benx ML 430 V8 w/custom TV, Video, UHF, speaker system
93 190E 2.6 w/ an amp, equalizer, and CD-changer, integrated w. stock stereo for integrated cellular phone speaker system
2001 C-Class - Maybe

[This message has been edited by Chiragp (edited 03-07-2000).]

How did you guys go about calculating the rolling diameter for various tires?

What is the rolling diameter currently on my stock 2000 E430?

The diameter of a 235/45-17 tire is calculated by:

[235 (Width of tire) / 25.4 (convert mm to inches)] x (.45) Aspect ratio of tire = 'A'

[Take that number 'A' x 2 (two sides of sidewall)] + 17 (add the rim) = total diameter of wheel 'B' = 25.32677165 inches

Actual rolling distance = Take 'B' x 3.1415 (pi) = 79.56405314 inches


Good luck and have fun.

Eric

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'00 E430 w/ Solaris H-7's
Brabus 19'' Monoblock V, 2 piece
H&R Sport Springs

'99 SLK230 Sport

What about certain brands? Michelin? Pirelli?

Cost and performance, I'd weigh both equally.

Can anyone recommend a good brand for 235/40 18" and 265/35 18" ?

Tirerack guys?

Thanks in advance.

[This message has been edited by taison (edited 03-08-2000).]

taison - There's one other aspect to this discussion that none of the previous posts touched on, and that is "wider is not necessarily better" in all cases!! The limiting factor is the width of your rims. Too wide a tire for the width of your rims will cause the tire's side wall to flex (i.e., bow out) too much, which in turn causes a distortion in the tire's contact patch with the road surface. An excellent guideline that has served me well thru numerous years of street, strip, on-track, and auto-crossing events is simply this: the difference in width between the tires cross section dimension and the width of the rims you want to mount them on should not exceed one inch. As an example, lets say you are anticipating mounting a 245/50 series tire on an 8" wide rim. The 245mm converts to 9.65" (245mm divided by 25.4 mm/inch). In this example the tire is more than 1.5" wider than the rim; not a good idea. A better choice would be to mount that tire on a 9" rim so there is no contact patch distortion. Even a 8.5" rim would be marginally acceptable since the difference in width is barely more than an inch (9.65"-8.5" = 1.05"). Luke or Shane @ TireRack may want to comment on this observation. In any event, I hope this is helpful info in your decision making process. Nothing beats first-hand experience in making past mistakes. Adios and keep the pedal to the metal!!

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Fred Prickett
85 500 SEL, 241,500 mi
90 5.0 Mustang LX conv.

Hmm...it seems like I really can't go for the staggered setup if I want to stick with the rule of no more than 1.5".

I calculated it and with the larger tires in the rear, I am about almost 2" over.

The Brabus rims I'm looking at have a width of 8.5". The only tires that will maintain a good rolling size and width is 235/40. I guess that's ok for all four tires.

You can still go with the staggered tire arrangement by just getting larger rims for the rear.
My personal recommendation is Pilot Sports.

Taison,

Do not go under 235mm in width because you will not have any rubber left to protect your expensive and very nice looking wheels from curb scrapes. Although Brabus recommends at least 225s, it is not wide enough. I have the same wheels on my 300E, 18x8.5 Monoblock IVs (35 offset) and did put 225/40/18 Pirelli P7000 Supersport on them. Now I wish for an extra set of eyes for parking. The sidewall is flush with the wheel and I have to be mighty careful not to damage them. I did have Assimetricos on, 235 wide but I experienced some rubbing as well as the 7000 is a lot cheaper as a replacement.
The Assimetrico is a lot stickier though.
Excellent choice of wheels. :-)

Alex