Bit of an update on the wheels and fitment
So the OEM wheels specs are the following:
- Front: 19x8.5, ET42. 235/35/19 tyre
- Rear: 19x11, ET50. 295/30/19 tyre
The BBS CH-R II do not come in a perfect fitment for the R8 unfortunately, and the R8 is not listed as a compatible fitment by BBS. However, Delroy at Prestige was fairly sure the following would work:
- Front: 20x9, ET30, 245/30/20 tyre
- Rear: 20x10.5, ET35, 305/25/20 tyre
So, they were ordered up and I crossed my fingers!!
They were sent straight to the garage, who fitted the H&R lowering springs before the wheels went on. Unfortunately - the concave of the rear wheel meant it was fitting the caliper. A few frantic calls between myself, Delroy and Camspec later - some 10mm H&R hubcentric spacers were sourced from Eurocarparts the same afternoon and the wheels went on! The spokes of the wheels were literally grazing paint off the caliper, that’s how tight the fitment was - so I changed to 11mm spacers soon after.
However, another problem was to follow!
As the springs settled slightly, started to get worse and worse rubbing in the arches - mostly at the front. To the point that I couldn’t drive the car properly and was dodging bumps in the road. Not good.
Nothing for it - I had to take a dremel to the plastic arch liners!
Note that there is also an outer wheel arch cover, removed in the pics above, that stayed untouched.
This improved things a lot but not 100%
So I took the car into Tuningwerkes in South Croydon- who deal with a lot of lowered cars, to see what they could do. They solved the rubbing at the rear, by trimming a small amount of plastic- but were unwilling to do too much trimming up front. When I collected the car, it was parked on a really uneven surface outside their garage which pushed the driver side wheel into the arch and highlighted where the tyre was making contact - this screw:
So - that screw had to go! The body panel and arch liner are secured by several other fixings - so I wouldn’t miss it.
You can see where the screw (passenger side pictured) had become shiny from the contact.
Around the same time, I was seriously considering shaving a few mm off the back of the wheels, following a suggestion from a fellow RS246 member at the Simply Audi show. I didn’t know this was “a thing” - but apparently a slight change in offset is possible as long as their is enough material on the inside hub of the wheel. I asked Camspec to help me find an engineering
Shop to do the work, when they mentioned maybe I just remove the 3mm shims first. The what???
I had no idea these 3mm spacers had been fitted! They’d been supplied with the wheels, and the garage had thrown them on. My theory is that they would be needed out back on a car without ceramics (I needed 11mm rear).
Sure enough, if you look really carefully they’re there! Tuningwerkes hadn’t noticed them either, as there is a slight recess in the disc.
These had to go! Still plenty of caliper clearance
With these gone, the rubbing was almost gone - certainly a hell of a lot better.
I figured if I could just get this tab pushed back a couple of mm I’d be rubbing free:
So I contacted a mobile arch rolling company called Arch Enemy, and asked them to come out, after checking they could roll aluminium.
Well, it turns out, that panel is actually plastic! Whoops.
Only one thing for it, more chopping! The chap from arch enemy got to work with a hot Stanley knife and grinder!
After all that rather daunting chopping of my new R8 plastics - I’m now rubbing free!!!
I’m free to drive it properly again, and it looks spot on IMO.