big problem - need help with snow wheel fitment
 

I bought a set of X6 rims with snow tires from a friend to use on my LCI X5 5.0. Tire store, not dealer, says they don't fit? I didn't get an exact explanation.

Can anyone confirm this is true. The wheels are style 232. They worked fine on an 09' X6. Is the hub different on the new X5?

Thanks for any help with this.

TG

No, it is different on an X6. But your tire store already knows that.

X6 rears have a different center bore than the X5, so you need to have the center of the rear rims machined to be the correct size - fronts should fit fine.

Fronts on both X5 and X6 are 74mm, rears on X5 are 74mm, rears on X6 are 72.5mm, a good wheel refurbishing place or machine shop can easily bore the X6 rears up to 74mm.

The other option is to run some spacers that will adapt down to 72.5 - they run about $120 for a pair for the rears (and helps the looks a bit also) Home Page > Search > es1899557 es1905746 - ECS Tuning Inc

:iagree:
The only worth while reply. (I know mine isn't ;) )

X

Thanks so much for the response. I had an indy shop look at them and they're doing just that, machining the rear bores.

Thanks for the detailed repy.

I'm interested in getting the X6 stye 232 wheels from a guy in my area. This would be for my 2008 X5. If spacers are needed for the rear, does anyone recommend a 15mm thichness one over the 20mm thickness ones. I'm still debating on whether I want to machine bore the rear to 74mm or use the spacers from the link above. Any suggestions?

Kiet

Also, any experts know the con's vs pro's of spacers vs machine boring , i.e. I would think the machined boring gives an exact fit which would be better.
I've never had spacers but have heard a lot about them over the years, what's the biggest risk and worst-case with those ?
(do they put more strain on that wheel axle/bolting ?)
Cheers

Spacers position the wheel where it was not intended to be by the vehicle designer. That means additional loads on wheel bearings, additional loads on suspension components, and in the case of the front wheels, different steering geometry. Spacers also introduce an additional failure mode because the mounting point can have a shear plane that doesn't exist in the standard wheel mounting. If they are well machined, the risk isn't large, but it is still there. If they are not well machined, given that you are increasing the load on the wheel studs by a large factor, you can have problems with studs breaking and in the worst case, wheels coming off. That applies particularly to any spacer that you bolt through from the wheel to the original hub. The load on the studs changes as the wheel rotates, so you can get fatigue failures of the wheel bolts.

The safest method is a spacer that is bolted on to the hub to eliminate the shear plane. That doesn't solve all the problems, but it eliminates one failure mode.

I will not use a spacer on my own vehicle due to the risks involved. If I had to use the wrong wheel, I would have it machined to fit the hub bore.

And for some more reading on the subject, see this thread and in particular the link in post #7

http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...l-spacers.html

I just checked w/ ECS Tuning and the following hub adapters does not fit our 2008 X5. Does anyone know where I can get adapters that will fit the X5? Thank you.