Wheel width question

Question

Wheel width question

LPwright (Automotive)

(OP)

23 Apr 23 13:49

I am working on a 1975 Super Beetle. The passenger side wheel sticks out of the wheel well about 3/4 inch and the drivers side wheel is tucked under the fender.
75 had a Strut suspension and when I adjusted the concave bolt for camber adjust in an attempt to pull the wheel further in only resulted in lot of "Toe" problems.

My question is this:

I am using a 17x7.5 width wheel with ET52.
I am thinking of putting a 7 inch wheel on the passengers side to pull it under the fender.
This will mean that I will have mis matched wheels on the front by 1/2 inch but the tire size will still be the same (205/40R17)

Will this cause any problems?
I will of course take it to a Alignment shop after this is completed.
Thanks for any help.

BrianPetersen (Mechanical) · Answer 1 · 2023-04-23 15:01:21

Instead of doing that, I would strongly suggest finding what's bent, and fixing that.

Covering up the problem cosmetically won't make the underlying bent parts straighten themselves out.

LPwright (Automotive) · Answer 2 · 2023-04-23 16:21:54

I should have explained better. I don’t think there are any bent parts. I have measured many times and can find no prob. I think the body was removed during pan replacement and not put back on properly. Rather than remove the body and spending lord knows how many hours on that, is it safe to use 2 different wheels widths and achieve the same result with much less work.
Thanks

BrianPetersen (Mechanical) · Answer 3 · 2023-04-23 17:44:37

I have a rough idea how beetle bodies bolt to the floorpan (granted: "beetle", not "super beetle"). It's impossible to put the body down half an inch off to the side relative to the floorpan. If it was a beetle, I'd be questioning how the front beam is attached to the front of the center tunnel and whether that whole thing is out of kilter. If the super beetle has an analogous front subassembly that incorporates the lower control arm and steering mounts which is bolted to the front of the tunnel similarly to how regular beetles have their front beam attached, start looking there. What's the cross-car distance between the chassis-end of the lower control arm and the edge of the fender, and is that the same on both sides, and if not, why not? Is the cross-car distance from the chassis-end LCA mount to something central on the floorpan the same on both sides? (Are the fenders correct for the vehicle - and the same on both sides?)

In the absence of knowing the underlying problem in your case, i.e. in an "all else being equal" situation, and in the absence of knowing whether your different-width wheels are different in "back-spacing" (probably) or in "offset" (which is measured relative to the centerline of the tire - which means it won't solve your geometry problem anyhow), it is NOT safe to put wheels of differing width and offset on either side of the car. If you install wheels of different offset in order to position one side's wheel more "out" and the other more "in", it's going to result in a significantly different scrub radius on both sides of the car, and that's sure to cause all sorts of handling and stability problems.

Something's bent or put together wrongly. You just haven't found it yet.

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Wheel width question