DeTomaso Mailing List: May 1997, Message #252
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I wrote an article on this many years ago. Your figures are right, but that is not offset. The back spacing of the two wheels is 1 inch more on the 8 inch wheel. The offset is only 1/2 of that because of the different widths (the center of the rim is 4 inches, the flange is 1/2 inch outside the center). Be that as it may, the 8 inch Campy is actually a better choice for the front than the original 7 inch. When I first wrote the article, I was making a point of the dangers to the steering when changing offset from what the original engineers intended (over-run from my days as a Ford Engineer). What I didn't take into account was Italian engineering. Not too long ago when I was trying to help my son figure out why he had so much "ridge steer" in his Pantera, I realized that the stock setup had a KPI angle (that imaginary line drawn from the upper ball joint to the lower ball joint) that intersected the road surface almost on the inside edge of the tire. THIS SHOULD BE IN THE CENTER OF THE TIRE. Theoretically our cars should all ridge steer horribly and dart all over the place when braking. For some reason, they don't. Anyway, any increased offset to the inside of your car should make it steer better. Mercedes Benz, a number of years ago, actually designed their KPI to the outside of the tire contact patch to give superior braking on unequal friction surfaces. Ted (Darth) Mitchell http://home1.gte.net/tmitch/pe.htm http://home1.gte.net/tmitch/chpie.htm http://home1.gte.net/tmitch/index.htm Microsoft Level 2 Site Builder Network Member ---------- From: Craig Cline <Craig_Cline@smtp.rc.trw.com> To: DeTomaso List <detomaso@wgate.com> Subject: Re: Wheel Offset Date: Thursday, May 08, 1997 6:44 AM I believe the actual wheel offset change between the 7" and 8" Campis is a full 1". It has been a while since I've measured mine, but from memory I believe the 7" wheels are 0 offset (even split - 3.5" front and back) and the 8" wheels are a positive 1" offset (3.5" front and 4.5" back). Anyone is free to make corrections to these numbers (bad memory)... Craig '74 #7352 - da Green One -------------------------------------- Date: 5/8/97 11:24 AM To: Craig Cline From: Jim Firanzi It seems the standard change many Pantera owners are making with stock campis is to either put the 8" on the front and get some later 10" for the rear, or even run 8" on all four wheels. What additional stress does this extra 1/2" of offset (8" vs. 7") impose on the front wheel bearings? I take it clearance with a 245/50 is not a problem... ? Does this little 1/2" change the suspension geometry much, and if so is it a good or bad thing for cornering? Jim Firanzi ------------------ RFC822 Header Follows ------------------ Received: by smtp.rc.trw.com with SMTP;8 May 1997 11:23:02 U Received: (from majordom@localhost) by tvol-gw.wgate.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id OAA10082 for detomaso-outgoing; Thu, 8 May 1997 14:06:57 -0400 Received: from hj.tvol.com (hj.tvol.com [38.219.83.2]) by tvol-gw.wgate.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with ESMTP id OAA10077 for <detomaso@tvol-gw.wgate.com>; Thu, 8 May 1997 14:06:42 -0400 Received: from smtp4.erols.com (smtp1.erols.com [205.252.116.101]) by hj.tvol.com (8.8.3/8.8.3) with ESMTP id OAA28914 for <detomaso@wgate.com>; Thu, 8 May 1997 14:08:01 -0400 (EDT) Received: from erols (nrf-as2s40.erols.com [207.172.65.103]) by smtp4.erols.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id OAA06056 for <detomaso@wgate.com>; Thu, 8 May 1997 14:10:27 -0400 To: detomaso@wgate.com (Pantera List) Subject: Wheel Offset Date: Thu, 08 May 97 17:23:13 GMT Message-ID: <M.050897.132313.93@erols> From: firanzi@erols.com (Jim Firanzi) X-Mailer: Quarterdeck Message Center [2.00] Sender: owner-detomaso@wgate.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: firanzi@erols.com (Jim Firanzi) ----------