First off, I want to apoligize for the photos, I just got a new camera and I haven't figured out all the gadgets and didn't realize it's only on a medium quality and it was starting to get dark.
Also mods, if you could place this one into the How to section and leave the other one in the Gen 2 section.
This was a long process and I made plenty of mistakes and spent a long time crunching numbers and I thought I would share some of the info. Thanks to Fade 2 Black for inspiring me to do this after seeing his bullits, thanks to Sloe and Shock for hours of help in deciding what directions to go...
First off, I had to call and get the load rating for the 18" mustang wheels. The company I called sells bullits, FR's, Saleen, etc... I found out that they advertise the weight rating at 1500 lbs, but that is quite under estimated for liability purposes... After calling people, I was told they should easily handle 1700 lbs on the street. So I did the following math
Load Rating Math
4674 lbs curb weight
57%/43% front/rear weight distribution
2664 lbs on the front
2010 lbs on the rear
So it looks like roughly...
1332 lbs for each front corner
1005 lbs for each rear corner
Once I determine I was alright on the load rating, I investigated our wheels...
Stock Lightning Wheel Specs
18"x9.5" with 5.8" of backspacing
the rime is 10.5" wide from front of the lip to back of the lip
I then figured out that I wanted deep dishes on the back and regulars in the front. To do this I decided on the 18"x9" anthracite FR500's up front and the deep dish 18"x10" antracite FR500's on the back. I found a set of barely used ones locally and bought them. I then had to make sure the 295/45/18's would fit the 9" and found out they did, I just put 3lbs less air pressure in them to keep them from wearing the middle faster.
Now the I new the 295's would fit, I had to determing if they were the tires I was going to go with. After a week or so of playing with numbers and consulting Shock and Sloe, I figured the 295's would be fine.
Next I hade to investigate the backspacing and specs on the FR500's.
FR500 Specs
18"x9" with 5.95" of backspacing
10" rim width from outer lip to outer lip
18"x10" with 6.38" of backspacing
11" rim width from outer lip to outer lip
With that info, I was off to find out what size adapters I would need to convert the 5x135 to 5x4.5. After A LOT of math and ordering some test adapters, I found out a lot of information. The thinest adapter that will fit the front of our trucks in 1.25" due to the design of the hub.
The back was much easier and the thinest you can go there is .8", but for safety purposes, I wouldn't go thinner than 1"
I then went and figured the adapters thicknesses into the offset and I got a little discouraged. On the rears, I was fine. The new rims and tires were going to stick out about .4" more than stock, which is what I wanted... But, the fronts were going to stick out .55"... This was not good and I was discouraged... Then a miracle happened last week... The anthracite FR500's became available with the 05 mustang offset last week. The 05's have .47" more offset and that was EXACTLY what I needed to hear. This meant that if I used the 05 FR's my front would stick out about .1" more than stock... I was stoked... I got on the phone and ordered two the next day... I went ahead and ordered the adapters too...
Now the truck requires two different types of adapters... On the back, I got ones that centered themselves to the truck and to the wheel. This style is called hubcentric/wheelcentric. You can see the lip in the middle.
Now due to that hub design on the front, you are not able to use the wheelcentric design, so it can only be hubcentric. See no Lip
I then mounted the adapters onto the truck and got ready for the wheel mounting...
Offset Views
I thought all was easy sailing, but one more bump in the road. Due to the increased offset on the 05's, the hub stick to far into the center bore up front to use the centercaps. But, I just painted the hub black to match the center caps. I am going to have my airbrush man eventually paint the hubs and centercaps antracite and put SVT on them in silver. It really doesn't look bad at all with the front centercaps off, actually you can barely tell unless I told you... It is slightly different that the rear, but it actually looks pretty good, when I am done, it will look even better.
Alright, so if you want to do this, you have a few options. If you want a set up like my for the bullits, FR's, or really any mustang wheel (double check backspacing first though on anything other than bullits or FR's) you will need 05 GT offset wheels up front in an 18x9 and 04 GT offset on the back in an 18x10. With that combonation, you will need the thinnest possible adapters which would be 1.25" hubcentric adapters on the front and 1" hubcentric/wheelcentric on the back. The only other choice I would go with would be 05 offsets all the way around (once the 18x10's are made) and get 1.25" thick adapters all the way around and get the hubcentric up front and hub/wheelcentric in the back. For other choices like 18x9's all the way around or 18x10's all the way around, PM me and I will get you the correct numbers... I hope this was helpful, I wrote this fast and probably forgot a step, just ask questions and I will answer them...
Final Pictures
Also mods, if you could place this one into the How to section and leave the other one in the Gen 2 section.
This was a long process and I made plenty of mistakes and spent a long time crunching numbers and I thought I would share some of the info. Thanks to Fade 2 Black for inspiring me to do this after seeing his bullits, thanks to Sloe and Shock for hours of help in deciding what directions to go...
First off, I had to call and get the load rating for the 18" mustang wheels. The company I called sells bullits, FR's, Saleen, etc... I found out that they advertise the weight rating at 1500 lbs, but that is quite under estimated for liability purposes... After calling people, I was told they should easily handle 1700 lbs on the street. So I did the following math
Load Rating Math
4674 lbs curb weight
57%/43% front/rear weight distribution
2664 lbs on the front
2010 lbs on the rear
So it looks like roughly...
1332 lbs for each front corner
1005 lbs for each rear corner
Once I determine I was alright on the load rating, I investigated our wheels...
Stock Lightning Wheel Specs
18"x9.5" with 5.8" of backspacing
the rime is 10.5" wide from front of the lip to back of the lip
I then figured out that I wanted deep dishes on the back and regulars in the front. To do this I decided on the 18"x9" anthracite FR500's up front and the deep dish 18"x10" antracite FR500's on the back. I found a set of barely used ones locally and bought them. I then had to make sure the 295/45/18's would fit the 9" and found out they did, I just put 3lbs less air pressure in them to keep them from wearing the middle faster.
Now the I new the 295's would fit, I had to determing if they were the tires I was going to go with. After a week or so of playing with numbers and consulting Shock and Sloe, I figured the 295's would be fine.
Next I hade to investigate the backspacing and specs on the FR500's.
FR500 Specs
18"x9" with 5.95" of backspacing
10" rim width from outer lip to outer lip
18"x10" with 6.38" of backspacing
11" rim width from outer lip to outer lip
With that info, I was off to find out what size adapters I would need to convert the 5x135 to 5x4.5. After A LOT of math and ordering some test adapters, I found out a lot of information. The thinest adapter that will fit the front of our trucks in 1.25" due to the design of the hub.
The back was much easier and the thinest you can go there is .8", but for safety purposes, I wouldn't go thinner than 1"
I then went and figured the adapters thicknesses into the offset and I got a little discouraged. On the rears, I was fine. The new rims and tires were going to stick out about .4" more than stock, which is what I wanted... But, the fronts were going to stick out .55"... This was not good and I was discouraged... Then a miracle happened last week... The anthracite FR500's became available with the 05 mustang offset last week. The 05's have .47" more offset and that was EXACTLY what I needed to hear. This meant that if I used the 05 FR's my front would stick out about .1" more than stock... I was stoked... I got on the phone and ordered two the next day... I went ahead and ordered the adapters too...
Now the truck requires two different types of adapters... On the back, I got ones that centered themselves to the truck and to the wheel. This style is called hubcentric/wheelcentric. You can see the lip in the middle.
Now due to that hub design on the front, you are not able to use the wheelcentric design, so it can only be hubcentric. See no Lip
I then mounted the adapters onto the truck and got ready for the wheel mounting...
Offset Views
I thought all was easy sailing, but one more bump in the road. Due to the increased offset on the 05's, the hub stick to far into the center bore up front to use the centercaps. But, I just painted the hub black to match the center caps. I am going to have my airbrush man eventually paint the hubs and centercaps antracite and put SVT on them in silver. It really doesn't look bad at all with the front centercaps off, actually you can barely tell unless I told you... It is slightly different that the rear, but it actually looks pretty good, when I am done, it will look even better.
Alright, so if you want to do this, you have a few options. If you want a set up like my for the bullits, FR's, or really any mustang wheel (double check backspacing first though on anything other than bullits or FR's) you will need 05 GT offset wheels up front in an 18x9 and 04 GT offset on the back in an 18x10. With that combonation, you will need the thinnest possible adapters which would be 1.25" hubcentric adapters on the front and 1" hubcentric/wheelcentric on the back. The only other choice I would go with would be 05 offsets all the way around (once the 18x10's are made) and get 1.25" thick adapters all the way around and get the hubcentric up front and hub/wheelcentric in the back. For other choices like 18x9's all the way around or 18x10's all the way around, PM me and I will get you the correct numbers... I hope this was helpful, I wrote this fast and probably forgot a step, just ask questions and I will answer them...
Final Pictures
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