Discreet 17inch setup
 

Greetings :)

I´ve decided to swap my old 16 inch wheels from my AP1 S2000 to 17 inch and my main concern is to keep as close as possible to the Honda´s original 17inch specs... I´ve come to the conclusion that is not an easy task specially on the offset side. I want to avoid much as possible wheels that come to close to wheel arch so I think I shouldn´t come lower that ET50. At these values options are thin :P From the abnourmous research I made only 2 wheels from Enkei:

Enkei M52 (480.775.6550): 17"x7.5 ET50 - 5x114.3
Enkei PDC (502.775.6550): 17"x7.5 ET50 - 5x114.3

From Tire Rack they say these are not guaranteed fitment for S2000 wich I find it very odd considering these are the only that come close to original specs. Is there any other size spec I should be worried about besides diameter, width, offset and PDC? Am I being too conservative excluding offsets lower that 50? What´s your opinion on "how low can we go" but still keeping the wheel and tyre inside the arches?

edit: forgot to ask if there are any staggered wheels at all? It seems everyone is just skipping that "detail" and using 7,5-8 width all around :P

Thanks for your attention :)

Be well,

Why not 2004 and later Honda S2000 wheels which fit perfectly and compliment the car's styling?

-- Chuck

What he said. You don't want 7.5 all around. Buy OEM Ap2 wheels and put OEM ap2 tire sizes on and call it a day.

Enkei PF01 in 17x8 +50 and 17x9 +60 is a nice alternative if you don't want OEM wheels.

With all due respect but... what is everyone using?!! Every wheel customization I see on the internet are off the original specs. I see people using ET40 with 8 width on 4 wheels.... I see customizations with 255´s on the rear on 9 wide wheels and you say "buy OEM AP2 wheels"?

Thanks Flanders... to be honest that is the kind of answer I was expecting... I do not want to use OEM 17 inch... I would like to swap for a Y-bore mesh pattern! Guess I´ll keep searching...

Thanks

Tire rack sells the TRmotorsports C3 which come in 9 +62. Work great with 245 and stock fenders/no roll required, if you want a square set up. They might have a narrower front wheel if you want staggered but im not sure about that, you would have to check.

Back in the day (10 years ago or so) most went with Volks that offered stock friendly staggered set ups with 50 and 63 offsets which are very close to the stock specs.

In recent years people have used various wheels and set ups, some "fit" and some do not, really depends which way you are wanting to go with the car. Tire widths have been discussed to death within the forum, again, tire choice is dependent on your wheel choice. If you go through the gallery section you'll see what some go with, the older threads will have pictures with OEM/Stock setups. Here's a good one for the Volk wheels - Volk wheel thread

To be fair you never said you didn't want OEM wheels you said you wanted discreet 17's and the OEM Ap2 wheels fit that description the best.

Now that we know you are specifically looking for after market wheels it helps us make suggestions. I don't know who "everyone" is when you are saying "It seems everyone is just skipping that "detail" and using 7,5-8 width all around :P" as extremely few S2000's are running 7.5 or 8 inch wide wheels all around. The reason being is you are putting a narrower rear wheel and tire on the car and a slightly wider front tire on the car. With a car that is already a little tail happy (AP1 in particular) this isn't ideal as it upsets the balance of the car. I believe this is one of the reasons Honda went to the 17's on the AP2 so there was more grip in the rear.

Since you are looking at 17's any aftermarket option you look at should be compared to the OEM 17 inch wheel specs which are Front 17x7 +55 and Rear 17x8.5 +65 with a 215/45/17 front tire and a 245/40/17 rear tire. This is the benchmark because we know these fit with zero modifications to the car on ALL model years. Now when you are looking at what other people have done you need to ask a few questions. First is how different are their wheel specs from these OEM specs and second what modifications had to be done for said wheels and tires to fit. Diameter really only effects the tire sizing unless you do something stupid like 20's and you already said you want 17's so diameter won't effect fitment here. The specs that effect fitment are the width and offset. The wider the wheel the higher the offset needs to be for it to fit without modifications. Similarly the lower the offset the more likely the wheel will require fender modification to fit the car.

So lets take the wheels Flanders suggested and compare them to the OEM AP2 wheels
Front
Compared to your existing wheel, this new wheel will have an inner rim which is 7.7mm closer to the suspension strut. The outer rim will poke out 17.7mm more than before.
https://www.willtheyfit.com/js/wtf/w...1.6&aspect2=45

Rear
Compared to your existing wheel, this new wheel will have an inner rim which is 1.4mm closer to the suspension strut. The outer rim will poke out 11.4mm more than before.
https://www.willtheyfit.com/js/wtf/w...4.3&aspect2=40

So that wheel set is a little more aggressive than the OEM ap2 wheels but not nearly enough to require fender modifications on a otherwise stock car. Lets compare another popular wheel spec 17x9 +45 which is the popular sizing for the RPF1's from enkei.
Compared to your existing wheel, this new wheel will have an inner rim which is 13.7mm further away from the suspension strut. The outer rim will poke out 26.4mm more than before.
https://www.willtheyfit.com/js/wtf/w...9.3&aspect2=40

This is just comparing the OEM ap2 rears to the 17x9 +45 but you can see how much more the wheel moves out thus requiring a fender roll and tab relocation in the rear and even a slight pull if put on the front.

Hopefully that helps you understand things a little more and helps you when you are looking at wheels. Here is the site for comparing the wheel sizes so you can see how different the aftermarket wheel you are looking at is from the OEM sizes.
https://www.willtheyfit.com/index.ph...h=9&offset2=45

I´m always considering the Honda´s 17 inch specs exactly because I don´t want to mess with car balance. Also that means fitment of custom wheels wouldn´t imply any structural changes. I do really apreciate your feedback :) There´s something I´m still wondering though... you said: "The reason being is you are putting a narrower rear wheel and tire..." can´t I fit a 245/40 on a 7.5 or 8 wide wheel? I thought the contact surface of the tyre is what matters in terms of grip, not the wheel width