Hi all, my tyres are all looking pretty grim right now and if I want to stay alive over the winter I figure I should source some new ones soon. However as they are so hard to find new, and expensive when I do, and my alloys are a little beaten up (by previous owners!) I was thinking of going for some larger more common sized alloys. Being a student I'm on a limited budget so a set of MGF alloys seems sensible. Any objections? Would much work be involved in this mod? Thanks In advance for your advice!

My car (just recently acquired) runs these but as you can see from the pictures the previous owner(s) had to extend the arches to cover them.

http://gtmrossak3.tumblr.com/

Bugger just lost the whole thing I typed.

Shorter version, have just fitted MGF wheels to my one, the tread sticks out a long way so I have cut the arches off and re-glassed them back on further out, easy to say but a bit longer to do and you have to re-spray the car as well unless you get some spats like the one in the link (could they be Mk1 Golf GTi wheel spats?).
I do have photo's but haven't loaded them to the computer.
What wheel and tyre size are you running at the moment?

Cheers guys, I'm currently running 185/55/13 tyres on metro gti alloys. normally I'd be up for modding the arches but i've literally just had it resprayed so maybe not! oops.. looks like i can get some 185/60/13 (or along those lines) for around £30 a piece that should fit, so I may have to go down that route. Unless anyone knows of some used 14" alloys for sale with the correct PCD, offset and the rest!?? Probably not! Any more thoughts let me know because i was pretty set on some slightly larger/ better looking alloys.

Thanks again!

OH, forgot to mention... That's a very nice looking (and sounding) k3.

Actually the video is someone else's Libra, I just stuck it up there to test the video posting...

Just got a few photo's to show why and what is involved, remember these are only the 185 wide tyres not the bigger 205 or 215 ones.

Measurement when fitted at the top of the arch.


Arch cut off and "spaced" out with ali strips


First lot of glassfibre in fill


After some filler work


After more filler work, nearly there but still not 100%

My bad!

Cheers for the photos, guess ill have to stick with the 13" ones for now as i cant afford to mess up this paint job. Looks like you did a good job though

Thanks again!

Any recent pics of the work to date here?

I was also thinking the same thing, would love to see a front on pic also.

Trying to work out whether its worth the hard work.

Some progress pics on the wide arches would be really good!!

Im at that stage of deciding to either DIY some wide arches or try and graft on some aftermarket ones. The main downside I see with doing it all myself and moulding in some new arches is that I'll end up painting the car.

I've got a K3 with a cage running on Metro front subframe, MGF rear currently running on 14" alloys as a common upgrade on Metro/100s. They don't pose problems on road tyres, but they do rub quite a bit when I go up to a higher profile to run Toyo 888s for track days.

Over the winter I intend to move the car up to MGF 15" alloys to be able to buy sensible rubber and the slight extra track can only benefit it when pushed hard. I know Jim Walker has done a nice job on his K3 which is the look I am trying to emulate but on a budget.

I've got a rebuilt CR PG1 gearbox with a Torsen diff to go in too, time to get busy in the garage.

Current look of my car:


Jim's K3 running on 15's and Toyo 888s:

Nice K3, I seriously toyed with the idea of changing to 15" but have stuck with 14" for the minute.

Would love to know more details/pics of the yellow one.

Nice looking cars there! Maybe mine will look that good one day...
Will be maybe looking into doing the MGF wheel mod over christmas so ill let you all know how it goes, with my filler skills the results could be interesting...

Any more progress Lyndiloo?

I still haven't bit the bullet and started the wide arch work on my car, although after a recent engine loom meltdown I am now starting the car improvements with an engine rewire

Did you have to modify the end of the tub too where the arch is part of the tub? There is no way I have enough clearance there either on my car for the 15s!

There's quite a few arch extensions that could be used -

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Universal-Arc ... 416f58b980

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Mazda-Mx5-Eunos-Wide-arch-flares-extensions-/251008780644?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item3a714a0964