67-69 barracuda front tire width

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moparmat2000

moparmat2000

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What is the widest tire without fender modification anybody here has run on a 67-69 barracuda. I am looking at 15x7 rims on all 4 corners and know a 255-60R15 will fit no problem on the rear. What about the front. Will a 255-60 fit without the fender hitting, or do I need something along the lines of a 225-60 R15. Running 73 up BBP brakes if that makes a difference.

Please dont reply what you did as far as dart, or duster etc, simply because the fender openings are cut and radiused different, and is kinda like comparing apple's to oranges.i need to know what guys running 67-69 barracudas are using and what if any clearance issues they may be having.

Thanks
Matt
 
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moparmat2000 said:
What is the widest tire without fender modification anybody here has run on a 67-69 barracuda. I am looking at 15x7 rims on all 4 corners and know a 255-60R15 will fit no problem on the rear. What about the front. Will a 255-60 fit without the fender hitting, or do I need something along the lines of a 225-60 R15.

Please dont reply what you did as far as dart, or duster etc, simply because the fender openings are cut and radiused different, and is kinda like comparing apple's to oranges.i need to know what guys running 67-69 barracudas are using and what if any clearance issues they may be having.

Thanks
Matt
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Certainly not the biggest possible, but i'm running 205-65-15's on 15x7 steelies from a Fifth Ave. on my '69 with complete '73-up front suspension and 11.75 brakes, at stock ride height, with no issues whatsoever. Would like to go taller for appearance...doesn't answer your question but at least it's a baseline.
 
Wow!!! That's very close to what I am working with. 15x7 fifth ave steelies, 73 up disc brakes w corboba big brake conversion. I was looking at 205 60 R15s and 215 60 R15s. Do you have a nice sideview pic mostly of the fender and rim w tire on it so I can get an idea what a 205 65 R15 looks like, and how it fills the fenderwell.

I have a worn out 255 60 as a mockup tire and wheel on a 15x7. I threw it on there with the car on jacks , dropped all torsion bar tension and lifted the LCA to an approximate ride height. Ran steering left and right lock to lock. It hits the fender in the front with a worn out 255 60, so I know I need to go smaller tire size in the front.
 
14D8EF11-359F-4D8B-8A22-A96D8E9AC174.jpeg
I’m running 235/60r15 on 15X7 lbp rally’s on my 67 notch with stock suspension .
 
moparmat2000 said:
Do you have a nice sideview pic mostly of the fender and rim w tire on it so I can get an idea what a 205 65 R15 looks like, and how it fills the fenderwell.
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Sure can, but won't be until tomorrow night after work. Also, spoke w/ a guy at a show over the weekend that is running 205-70-15's on 15x5.5's on the front of his 69 along w/ 275-60-15 drag radials on 15x8 rears and i really liked the "big 'n little" look.
 
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moparmat2000 said:
I wonder if the offset is the same as fifth ave rims
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I don't know the backspace on the front rims of mine but it has the mustang disc brake conversion with calipers from HemiX. I know I like the way everything works on it. I had the back wheels custom build to fit the tires on the back.
 
205.65.15 (8x25.4)

upload_2019-9-5_21-3-44.jpeg
 
The better question IMO is what is the biggest size tire that you can put on a 7" rim. And my answer to that would be a 205 for cornering and a 215 for not.From a streeter's perspective (me);
On the front;
If you put a 215 on there then you will have to drop your tire pressure for optimum treadlife. And then it won't corner worth a fiddle-fart. At about 26psi, the tire will begin to roll over and pick up the inside edge off the road, while getting dangerously close to running on the sidewall. By 24 psi it feels like crap in the corner. For cornering, IMO it is better to run more psi, to stabilize the tread. The 205 will run probably around 29 for optimum treadlife, and you can bump that to maybe 32, or more, for spirited driving.If you plow around a turn with the fronts at 24psi, and mount a curb , you will be buying at least one new rim.
If you hit it at 32psi, there's a good chance you'll bounce up and over it; that's if you have the presence of mind to steer into it at the last moment. I have saved my aluminum slot-mags that way many many times.

On the back,
same thing except now you have the tires trying to simultaneously deal with the power application.

Yes I have a 68 Barracuda.
Up front,I run Sbp 235/60-14s on 7.75s at 29 for treadlife.
On the rear are BBP 295/50-15s on 10s running 24psi for treadlife.
With anything 275 or less out back, that pos stinking car kept spinning me out, pushing me up on the inside median and facing backwards.Talk about oversteer. Okay, I admit it, I stayed on the power too long hoping to ride it out,lol. Anyway 295s solved that. Now I can slide around any turn with no regard for the amount of rubber that is peeling off my tires. Ok wait; they're BFG radial T/As they don't peel, they scream and beg for mercy, but I digress.
To answer your question;
The biggest tires I have fit on my 68Barracuda were; 245/50-15s on barely big enough 8s up front, and 325/50-15s on not nearly big enough 10s out back. As a streeter, it wasn't all that much quicker/better/whatever, than with the 235/295 combo; but with the sticky 245s up front, I could get away with doing stoopid stuff more often. 235s take some finessing. and horsepower steer. and run-off room when she goes into 4-wheel slide mode, cuz it doesn't always go where you think it will, when that happens..
EDIT
Oh also, when yur sliding sideways, the brakes make it worse,usually.
 
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AJ/FormS said:
The better question IMO is what is the biggest size tire that you can put on a 7" rim. And my answer to that would be a 205 for cornering and a 215 for not.From a streeter's perspective (me);
On the front;
If you put a 215 on there then you will have to drop your tire pressure for optimum treadlife. And then it won't corner worth a fiddle-fart. At about 26psi, the tire will begin to roll over and pick up the inside edge off the road, while getting dangerously close to running on the sidewall. By 24 psi it feels like crap in the corner. For cornering, IMO it is better to run more psi, to stabilize the tread. The 205 will run probably around 29 for optimum treadlife, and you can bump that to maybe 32, or more, for spirited driving.If you plow around a turn with the fronts at 24psi, and mount a curb , you will be buying at least one new rim.
If you hit it at 32psi, there's a good chance you'll bounce up and over it; that's if you have the presence of mind to steer into it at the last moment. I have saved my aluminum slot-mags that way many many times.

On the back,
same thing except now you have the tires trying to simultaneously deal with the power application.

Yes I have a 68 Barracuda.
Up front,I run Sbp 235/60-14s on 7.75s at 29 for treadlife.
On the rear are BBP 295/50-15s on 10s running 24psi for treadlife.
With anything 275 or less out back, that pos stinking car kept spinning me out, pushing me up on the inside median and facing backwards.Talk about oversteer. Okay, I admit it, I stayed on the power too long hoping to ride it out,lol. Anyway 295s solved that. Now I can slide around any turn with no regard for the amount of rubber that is peeling off my tires. Ok wait; they're BFG radial T/As they don't peel, they scream and beg for mercy, but I digress.
To answer your question;
The biggest tires I have fit on my 68Barracuda were; 245/50-15s on barely big enough 8s up front, and 325/50-15s on not nearly big enough 10s out back. As a streeter, it wasn't all that much quicker/better/whatever, than with the 235/295 combo; but with the sticky 245s up front, I could get away with doing stoopid stuff more often. 235s take some finessing. and horsepower steer. and run-off room when she goes into 4-wheel slide mode, cuz it doesn't always go where you think it will, when that happens..
EDIT
Oh also, when yur sliding sideways, the brakes make it worse,usually.
Click to expand...

That all sounds great, however the difference in sidewall height from a 205 60 to a 215 60 is 4.84" vs 5.08". This is maybe 1/4" difference the 215s being taller.

What I figured out since I started this thread is, factory formula S pizza cutters were an E70-14 tires on 14x5 5" rims which translates to a 205/70R14 tire. This has a 25.3" diameter tire, and a 5.65" sidewall

A 215/60R15 on a 7" rim is obviously wider by close to 1 inch, maintains a 25.2" diameter, and has a squattier shorter sidewall at 5.08" height compared to the OEM.
 
Most of us just reach into the toolbox and haul out the tin-snips.
You need a good inch clearance from the fender corner to the nearest part of the tire as it travels thru it's arc, and travel. And the reason is because when you are backing up and turning, while riding the brake, the tire is gonna get into the fender real quick, as the strut rod moves ahead. A half inch at ride height, is not enough.
If you run much taller than the E70-14s,and push them out further than the factory IIRC Zero offset wheels, then you will start to get into scrub-radius issues. This is manifested by the car following every longitudinal ripple in the asphalt, no matter how you set the alignment. So there you are with a constant nervous twitch that never goes away; It's a royal PITA. On concrete it's better but still nervous.
My 235s mathout to about 25.1 and are reasonably well behaved with a 3.75bs. I run them at 29psi for long treadlife; the rim needs to be a lil wider but 14x8s on 4.5bs occupy the same space as the Upper BJ, so that's a no go. 15s with a 4.5 bs will clear the factory small BJ, at ride height, withe wheels pointing straight ahead; and if you never turned more than a few degrees, and never cycled the suspension very far,it would be fine, lol. But IDK about the 73 knuckles and later BJ.
You need a 17 to get up and over the BJ. And then the tire gets into the strut rod. and the frame.

I don't know if you are aware of this, but a radial passenger tire is only the branded size on a rim that is 70% of the branded size.
So if you have a 215, the 70%rim would be 150, rounds to 6". This is not the recommended rim size; just the size used to create the branded number, Furthermore the brand is rounded to the nearest 5mm. So a 215 could be as little as say 210.1 to as much as 219.9; both round to 215. This is important to know when calculating heights.
If you put that 215 on a 7" rim, the section might grow .5 or a tad more. So then your 215 becomes a 227 +/- 4.9mm. which is 222.1 to 231.9; that's a range of nearly 10 mm. By itself this is not important, until the sidewalls rub on something, because your calcs are skewed. Like when the fender comes down on the rear tire when you hit a pothole.
I finally narrowed my rear and relocated the springs. Now I can run any common 4.5bs wheel, up to 10 inches, even at my lowered ride height.
Don't forget about the stepped lip in the rear tubs. If your rear sits low, the wrong offset rim can put the tire into that lip pretty quick. About the tallest tires I have put into my Barracuda rear, is 28", but I had to push the axle back a bit. 27s fit fine.
 
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I think I am gonna go with the 225/60R15s for the front. Slightly larger outer diameter than the stock 14" tires. That 1 inch extra width is only a half inch each side. I think they are gonna be a go for the front. Prob put a 255 60R15 on the rear. Sure theres room to go wider, but I have 7" steelies. Its what I want to use.
 
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Back in the day, we would run 14x7 with E60 tires. In the rear 14x8 with G50 tires. All with 10" brakes. I will leave it as an excersise for the reader to convert to metric terms.
 
I don't know if there is a direct conversion. The old system was based on actual treadwidth, while the new is based on a section width. Well, I mean I guess you could back-calculate but IDK how accurate that might be.

I also remember Es on the front and Gs were as big as would fit in the back of my 70Dart. Seven sets of rear tires in four summers; 2or3 summers of which were in highschool,lol. And the front burned off all the Es. Daymn that 340!
 
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moparmat2000 said:
I think I am gonna go with the 225/60R15s for the front. Slightly larger outer diameter than the stock 14" tires. That 1 inch extra width is only a half inch each side. I think they are gonna be a go for the front. Prob put a 255 60R15 on the rear. Sure theres room to go wider, but I have 7" steelies. Its what I want to use.
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Hi do the 225/60 r15 fit with disc brakes without rubbing
 
Joerg said:
Hi do the 225/60 r15 fit with disc brakes without rubbing
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It’s very close. Dependent on alignment, production tolerances, and past bodywork.

Ive run 15x7 with 4.25 backspace and 225/60/15. 73 disc/spindles, offset upper bushings, poly strut bushings, rubber LCA bushings

I’ve seen others try with 73 disk and they have rub. Not sure of their parts, alignment, or body history.
 
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