Anybody running 17" Cobra Bullit rims on a Duster

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I think the 17 is a good size. Old cars start looking kind of funky with anything bigger.

I'm obviously a little biased now, but I think 18's work just fine on these cars too. Don't get me wrong, I think you have to pay more attention to ride height and tire diameter to get the 18's to look right than you do with the 17's. I used to be firmly in the "nothing bigger than a 17" wheel camp", but the tire selection and improvement in tie rod end clearance made me go with 18's on the Duster, and I think it works.

17's work well too, I still think they're probably the best suited to these cars visually. And if you want to stick with a 255 wide front tire or narrower they work great because the tie rod clearance doesn't really come into play to get the tire to fit. To move up to a 275 in the front it makes life a lot easier to go with a 18" rim.
 
Haaa... I love all the info coming back. Thank you guys.
Ya know what... I think Im going to buy them, if they dont fit.... There are a host of Mustang guys that will buy them up and I can barely lose my arse when the pair are only $140.00

I think Ill snatch them up, throw them in the corner and when the time comes... Ill see if they fit. :)
 
Yeah the tie rod clearance could be nice, but for myself I don't think I'll ever run wider than the 245s on the front. When I decided to go to a wider rear tire, I was a little bummed out with the tire hooves in a 17. I wanted a big fat radial. I wound up going with a 315 but on the duster it looks like there is still room for more if your cutting anyway, just not a lot of choices in a 17 for a regular radial. I'm running 275 on the back now and a 315 isn't really that much wider when you compare them.
If the price is right and you aren't going to miss the cash, buy them. You could always narrow a housing to fit. Just make sure you will be able to find a matching front rim.
 
If it's just the fitting hitting, you can grease it then pull the grease fitting and plug it with a short 1/4" bolt.

I wish that was the only thing.

So I pulled the grease zerk and put the wheel on. The next thing I did was turn the wheel from lock to lock. I found that the rim hit the A-Arm in both directions (i.e. turning it all the way right or turning it all the way left). Keep this in mind, this is on a '74 Duster.

Right now, the A-Arm problem is the only thing keeping from running the Bullits's on the front. I don't know if running tubular A-Arms from Firm Feel or Reilly Motorsports will solve my problem by making the A-Arms narrower so that the wheel can turn fully at any point of suspension travel.

Something to work on later. Right now, I'm focusing my attention on engine and body work.
 
I wish that was the only thing.

So I pulled the grease zerk and put the wheel on. The next thing I did was turn the wheel from lock to lock. I found that the rim hit the A-Arm in both directions (i.e. turning it all the way right or turning it all the way left). Keep this in mind, this is on a '74 Duster.

Right now, the A-Arm problem is the only thing keeping from running the Bullits's on the front. I don't know if running tubular A-Arms from Firm Feel or Reilly Motorsports will solve my problem by making the A-Arms narrower so that the wheel can turn fully at any point of suspension travel.

Something to work on later. Right now, I'm focusing my attention on engine and body work.

I had the same problem with my 18x9's in the front. They hit the stock A-arms at full droop and full lock in either direction. I installed a set of Magnumforce non-adjustable bushed UCA's, problem solved.

Any of the "V" shaped tubular UCA's should be fine, and should take care of your problem. The only one's I would avoid are ones shaped like a "U", because they may not give you enough clearance. I know the Firm Feel UCA's are "V" shaped and should work fine. The earlier RMS UCA's were "U" shaped, but I think they've updated their design since then to increase clearance.
 
If full droop is the only issue, it may not be a problem in "real" life. There might be some situations where you might see suspension movement that great - strange driveway entrance or something like that, but if you know that's coming you can change your angle of entry. Also, if you're running bigger T-bars, they will also limit your suspension movement. The 1.14's I have on my valiant have almost no preload on the adjusters - just enough to keep the bits and pieces from rattling. Full droop with those bars is about 3" below full weight resting ride height. Even if I'm pulling a Duke Boys move, I'll never see enough droop to get the wheels in to the A-arms. You want your wheels pointing straight ahead on those moves anyway...

Clair
 
Yeah I really don't see that being an issue. If you are doing wheels up launches, you probably don't need 17" wheels.
 
"Even if I'm pulling a Duke Boys move, I'll never see enough droop to get the wheels in to the A-arms. You want your wheels pointing straight ahead on those moves anyway..."

Clair


Hahahaha!
 
I agree, if the interference is only at full lock and full droop it's unlikely to be an issue on the street. When are you going to have your suspension fully unloaded with the wheels cranked to full stop on the street? Your car would pretty much need to be airborne to unload the suspension that far, even a driveway or giant pothole is unlikely to unload the suspension that far that fast.

Of course, even knowing that I still replaced my UCA's. I had been thinking about doing it anyway, and its just one of those things I'd rather not ever think about.

I also put taller polyurethane bump stops on my UCA's when I put the tubulars on. With the 1.12's I have pretty much zero preload on my adjusters where I have my ride height set, as Clair said just enough to keep them from rattling. Raising the upper bump stops allowed me to back of the adjuster a smidge more and keep a little tension on them at full droop. With the car lowered as much as it is I have a ton more "negative" travel than I do positive, probably still almost 3x as much.
 
I had the same problem with my 18x9's in the front. They hit the stock A-arms at full droop and full lock in either direction. I installed a set of Magnumforce non-adjustable bushed UCA's, problem solved.

Any of the "V" shaped tubular UCA's should be fine, and should take care of your problem. The only one's I would avoid are ones shaped like a "U", because they may not give you enough clearance. I know the Firm Feel UCA's are "V" shaped and should work fine. The earlier RMS UCA's were "U" shaped, but I think they've updated their design since then to increase clearance.

That's good to know. Thanks! Once I get it back to driving condition, I'll be working on suspension and tires.
 
Just finished putting 17x8 mustang wheels on my 64 Barracuda:

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Picked up a set of 17 x 8" Bullitt wheels and I'm liking the look so far.
 

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So when I bought my car the previous owner had cut the inside fender lip and swapped in what I suspect is a B-body 8 3/4 rear end with BBP. I stuck with the KH brakes and upgraded to the Mustang rotors on the front to get BBP.

The wheels came with 245/45 tires all around and I did not have to do anything to make them fit on the rear. On the front I believe I have worked it out that I need a 3/8" spacer to keep the rims from hitting the UCA, and to keep the tires from rubbing the frame.
 
Just got mine on last weekend
 

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Has anybody run into this problem? Just purchased some American Muscle rims (polished bullits) 17 x 8 with 245 45 17 tires.The rears are fine 1/4 "spacer on the drivers side to clear the spring,the problem is the front.The hub on the rotor extends out 1 1/2 inches but the depth of the bore register in the rim is only 1 inch.If you were to bore out the rim you would loose the cap register area.Even with a 1/2 spacer the cap won't seat properly on the rim.I know I could run a 5/8 or 3/4 spacer (with long studs) but am concerned the tire will be extremely close to the wheel lip opening on the front fender.The rims have 5.72 backspace. Anybody have experience with these rims???????
 
What year car? I'm running 1" spacers up front with the adapter style add on studs.
 
Has anybody run into this problem? Just purchased some American Muscle rims (polished bullits) 17 x 8 with 245 45 17 tires.The rears are fine 1/4 "spacer on the drivers side to clear the spring,the problem is the front.The hub on the rotor extends out 1 1/2 inches but the depth of the bore register in the rim is only 1 inch.If you were to bore out the rim you would loose the cap register area.Even with a 1/2 spacer the cap won't seat properly on the rim.I know I could run a 5/8 or 3/4 spacer (with long studs) but am concerned the tire will be extremely close to the wheel lip opening on the front fender.The rims have 5.72 backspace. Anybody have experience with these rims???????

Yes, its a common problem. The hub register has to be bored out in order to run the Mustang rims, or even a great many aftermarket rims. I had to have the Enkei RPF1's on my Duster bored out, which makes finding a wheel cap pretty interesting.

The initial bore on my enkei's was 73mm before it tapered, so I just had it machined out to 73mm. Right now I'm using these to cover the spindle nut and grease cap...

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-89-8059s

I know everyone has to open up the bores on the mustang rims, but I don't know what they're running for wheel caps. Needless to say most of the caps are too shallow to allow the hub to pass through and still fit below them.
 
You can't really get around it. I looked at all kinds of caps and finally just got new dust covers, put some lipstick on them and called it good.
I also decided that I didn't want to molest new wheels so I had the rotor snouts turned down by my machinist to fit the wheel register.
 

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with the bullit rims I had my buddy turn the rotor down to fit the rim. I was hoping to run a set of the ARengineering center caps but he couldn't be bothered trying to help me figure out if they would fit a stock rotor or not. im still running no caps.
 
I had my wheels machined out to clear my hubs. Since they started at 73.1mm and then necked down to 2.5", I just had them machined straight through at 73mm.

I found I could run this cap on my rims. It sticks out a little bit, but it covers everything.

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-89-8059s

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Initially I just painted them silver to match the rims. Then I managed to find a generic wheel cap that fit my RPF1's, so I used it in the rear and then cut the front cap down and JB welded the wheel cap onto the cover...

Rears with generic cap

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Fronts with cut down metal cap painted to match the rim,and the generic cap JB welded to it

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