BMW Mini Wheels fit the Elan (with a bit of machining)

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Postby Nige » Mon 04.06.2007, 11:27

Just a little up date on this. Given that the first track day (last year) after fitting the Mini wheels and Toyo R888s was so wet I never really got the chance to see how well the tyres worked (benefit was I took little wear out of them) but was still impressed at the level of wet weather grip available from what is really a dry weather tyre . Given dry conditions at Castle Combe last weekend the story was a little bit different. Firstly, these tyres grip :-D . I am sure I didn't fully exploit the grip they offer but I was finding my way, secondly was the way in which they improved the braking. My Hi-Specs are good (Red stuff pads front, Green stuff at rear) but when combined with the tyres the car really did stop. I felt that I could brake beyond the marked braking points (and did on a couple of occasions) and felt that the braking Zone was probably a little too long in some of the corners.

Took the R888s off the car this weekend to refit road tyres for the trip to Le Mans, I nearly left the R888s on but wanted to look closely at the wear on them and preserve their life for the track rather than use it up on the road. The wear is what you would expect on a clockwise circuit where most of the corners are Right Handers. Front Right tyre has the least wear, rear Right has some wear, rear Left, well scrubbed with noticeable wear and front Left is worn the most. All tyres are still road legal (tread depth) and I would expect to fet another 2 or 3 track days out of them before they become illegal for road use. I will maximise the life of the tyres by moving front to rear and vice versa.
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17" wheels

Postby taffy » Sun 10.06.2007, 16:33

Hi.
Intresting thread.
What tyre pressure should be used on te 17" tyres?
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Lots of pain and little gain
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Postby Nige » Wed 20.06.2007, 22:31

I've found the recomended pressures are fine there or there abouts (29 PSI front and 28 PSI rear is my norm) for normal road use. However as I tend to use the 17" for track work only I put a bit more air into them say 33PSI front and 32 PSI rear, a check of pressures after comming off the last track session showed the fronts had risen to 36 PSI.
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Postby scrags69 » Thu 25.10.2007, 14:31

I've read this thread with interest and am interested in adapting some MINI wheels to fit my Elan. A question for Nige though, where did you get the machining of the the centre hole done and does this have any consequences to strength etc?
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Postby Nige » Tue 30.10.2007, 09:59

I had the centre bore of the wheels machined by a local engineering works, seem to recall it cost me about £50 cash for all 4 to be done. It was a pretty straightforward job as once they had set the nmachine up to do one wheel the remaining 3 were simple to do. The amount of metal to be removed is tiny and there is plenty of metal in the wheel centre in the first place so I have no worries about weakening the wheel.
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mini rims

Postby nick16v » Sun 30.12.2007, 03:30

Bmw Mini wheels do fit with a slight skim of centre bore, I have been using 17" oz prodrive's for 2 yrs, light as made for mini racing season. You could choose from loads of aftermarket types.
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Postby MattDon » Mon 23.06.2008, 13:18

has anyone tried the bbs alloys? these
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Postby XiPHiAS » Mon 23.06.2008, 16:18

MattDon wrote:has anyone tried the bbs alloys? these


I'm goïng to testfit these within some weeks.
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