Dumb question about wheels
 

I have a 2003 E53 3.0i X5... I am about 8 months away from owning it out right. Once its paid off I am looking to buy a newer one around 3 years old or under 30K miles.

My question is I want to buy wheels and would like to carry them over to my new rig next year. Do the E53 and E70 have same wheel pattern?

IIRC the E70 has a larger hub bore (you could just get wheels made for E70 and use hub rings on the E53)... everything else should be fine on both.

Ditto...just like the e39 5 series being the odd horse in the barn with it's 74.1mm wheel hub and all previous and the following e60 5 series have a 72.56mm wheel hub...BMW did the same thing with the e70 X5 and designed their wheels with a 74.1mm wheel hub.

So as stated above, e53 wheels would need their wheel hub bored out larger to fit on an e70...and e70 wheels would require hub-centric rings to reduce the larger 74.1mm wheel hub to the smaller 72.56mm wheel hub size to mount on an e53.

The other specs (wheel offset & bolt pattern) are the same.

Which wheels are you looking at?

Ok Im a little slow about cars from the floor board down... So I could and should buy wheels that fit the E70 and use a hub adapter for my current E53?

Can you explain further? What is the hub your referring to? <am I feel dumb right now sorry

The hub is the lip of the brake disc (if you want), where you place the wheel on. That lip (a circle) has an outer diameter of 72.56mm and your wheel "hole" has the ID the same: 72.56mm. The e70 has that dimension increased to 74.1mm. So if you want to use the 72.56mm hub wheels, you need hubcentric "spacers", because you cannot fit 72.56mm over 74.1mm.

Here's a pic with a spacer, you can see the wheel hub (the small round lip) clearly:

http://www.burgertuning.com/images/B...W_135i_E82.jpg

Thanks this explains it well.. So I should but E70 wheels and get the hub spacer for my current e53

Not sure if I'm understanding you correctly....the e53 has the SMALLER wheel hub...the e70 the LARGER wheel hub. To mount e53 wheels on the e70...you'd need to make the hole LARGER. Using a hub centric ring on an e53 wheel to mount on an e70 would make the hole even smaller.

This is a hub centric ring which you insert into the wheel's hub or slide onto the vehicles hub...this will make a wheel that has a larger wheel hub fit to a smaller hub. This allows an e70 wheel to be mounted on an e53 by using a hub centric ring:


To mount an e53 wheel on an e70...the wheels' hub needs to be made larger...thus the wheel needs to be bored out (made larger)...or you can find wheel spacers (which add more weight etc. to the suspension) that would fit the 74.1mm e70 wheel hub on one side and then has a 72.56mm hub on the other side that will fit the e53 wheel. This bridges the difference between the opening in the wheel and the hub on the car (like going from a smaller e53 wheel to the larger e70 hub:

What I am saying is I am going to buy wheels hat will fit correctly on a E70 (Because I am getting one by end of the year) But I would like to put the same wheels on my current E53.

If the hub is bigger on the E70 wont I just need a spacer for the E53? Am I confused or something?

Are you buying the E70?

Yes by end of next year. I currently have E53.

So Im going to buy wheels for my future vehicle. And use these rings to fit on the E53 for now.

Does this make sense?

Now I understand what you were trying to say. If you're buying wheels for the e70 in advance...and you want to run with them on the e53...you'll need HUB CENTRIC RINGS (not wheel spacers) to reduce the size of the hub.

• E70 to E53 = hub centric rings to reduce from 74.1mm to 72.56mm
• E53 to E70 = wheel spacers to increase from 72.56mm to 74.1mm

The ones who own (or used to own) an E39 would be an expert at this hub-bore issue :D (Doru, QSilver7)

Yes, buy wheels to fit the e70 and buy rings to make the e70 wheels fit your e53. Once you sell the e53 and have the new ride, remove the rings and mount them on your e70.

Ah...you raise a very good point. :iagree:

When the time comes and you sell the e53...do make sure that you check the hub on the e53 and the wheels for the e70 to make sure all of the hub centric rings are accounted for & none of the rings remain behind.

They can sometimes (depending on if you get plastic or aluminum rings) remain on the car's hub and cause problems when mounting proper size wheels...or remain stuck inside the wheel's hub and cause issues when trying to install the wheel onto the vehicle's hub.

You can do a simple google search using "hub centric ring stuck" and see what I mean. :)