Apex ARC 8 + Coils.....Will it fit?

[135Pats]

Just mounted new wheels and tires yesterday, below are the specs
18” 8.5 ET 45
18” 9.5 ET 62
Yokohama S-Drive 225/265
5mm spacers on all four corners

On stock ride height there’s plenty of room in the back, I’m not too worried there. Up front there’s some room for drop, but it’s pretty tight from the wheel to the shock tube, I’d estimate about 15mm or so. Everything fits well and dandy right now, but do you guys think I’ll be able to drop the car a modest amount on ST coils? I had them on earlier, but took them off before the new wheels and tires came in. I’m pretty confident I can get away with the drop, but what change should I expect in terms of wheel/tire to shock tube clearance? The STs have conical springs and the adjusting collar to consider as well. It’s going to be tight…..Any comments are appreciated, even if you aren’t running ST coils. Again, it’s the front that I’m most concerned about. Surely we can make this fit right….I know we have pathetic wheel specs, but my specs for the front are not at all aggressive. Would be very lame if the coils caused major issues.


Fire away!

[Stohlen]

Wheel to the shock tube or wheel to the spring perch. Width wise you have nothing to worry about. Height wise is where you should be concerned.

Just drop it as much as you can or as much as you like. The nice things about coils is that if it rubs you can raise it up a few turns.

[froop]

Woah 15mm? You have no issues. I don't have Arc-8s but mine are like ~3mm from the strut and I don't have any running issues. If I drop I'll need spacers but yeah I don't think you'll have any issue as long as you don't slam it.

[135Pats]

Sorry spring perch, wasnt thinking. Yea with the spacers in front im doing OK on clearance, its just crazy how tight space is.

[HP Autosport]

You should be ok. It is a tight fit for sure.

-Mike

[Tommeh]

I dont know about 15mm in the rear. I use to run 265/18/35 RS3's rears with a 5mm and it was perfect. When I upgraded to 275/18/35 NT01s I could no longer uses the spacer or I would be rubbing 100% of the time.

[135Pats]

Originally Posted by Tommeh

I dont know about 15mm in the rear. I use to run 265/18/35 RS3's rears with a 5mm and it was perfect. When I upgraded to 275/18/35 NT01s I could no longer uses the spacer or I would be rubbing 100% of the time.

I meant space up front between the strut and wheel, my fault if it came off differently. It’ll be tight…but should work. Not looking for a big drop, just a little more aggressive. I DD in DC and VA, so it’s just not feasible to slam it on somewhat aggressive tires for a 1er.

Also thanks for the reply HP, I’ll actually be PM’ing you guys soon about some other suspension parts. These non-m control arms gotsta go!

[SfValley335i]

I run 265 with 15mm spacers dropped on ST coils. You'll rub alot if you lower the rear, i shaved my fenders and I still rub, the tire hits at 9 o clock, not at 12 o clock as you would expect. The tire to fender gap on my car is about 1 finger space...

What actually helped my rubbing in turns, hard acceleration or hard dips was m3 subframe bushings. I have michelin pss which run a little fatter than your typical tire.

[SfValley335i]

I might add I run 3mm spacers in front... it would rub on average dips and hard turns in canyons... 3mm spacer helped it

[135Pats]

Originally Posted by SfValley335i

I run 265 with 15mm spacers dropped on ST coils. You'll rub alot if you lower the rear, i shaved my fenders and I still rub, the tire hits at 9 o clock, not at 12 o clock as you would expect. The tire to fender gap on my car is about 1 finger space...

What actually helped my rubbing in turns, hard acceleration or hard dips was m3 subframe bushings. I have michelin pss which run a little fatter than your typical tire.

Crap that's right where I want it in the back...Though like you said, 15mm spacers and PSS are going to protrude more than my setup. We'll see I guess, i'll be sure to follow up in this thread once the coils go back on. Subframe bushings and dif lockdown will go in once HFS-4 is installed.

[dfv2]

I'm on ST coils with an aggressive drop, and EC7's staggered with 245 upfront and 275's in the rear. In case you run into lower adjustment collar interference issues, here's what I did...

The fronts need to be converted to a 60mm 6" spring (went with a 450lb/in hyperco setup). This way the perch can be raised above the tire and still work with an aggressive ride height. Since the ST/KWv1's utilize the stock spring perch, you need to switch those out for a camber plate and 60mm spring perch, I went with GC street plates.

This was Eddy's original recommendations to me regarding this issue:

Originally Posted by Eddy@ApexRaceParts

245 tires will need camber plates to fit properly. If you install camber plates it is the perfect time to replace your front KW cone springs with traditional cylindrical 6" main springs. It's very common to do a spring swap, and that mod adds a lot of inner clearance which is necessary for proper 1 series fitment. Negative 1.5 degrees should be enough to get that to clear. Do not waste money on M3 control arms as they do not add negative camber in a way that increases clearance at the top.

I rubbed quite a bit in the rear with a mild roll. I'm dropped all the way on the rear collars, no-finger-gap. Once I did the RSFB install (went with whiteline bushings) and e93 M3 bar (overkill, yes) the rubbing pretty much vanished. The RSFBs from whiteline moved the RSF down a bit, changing the camber link geometry favorably in this case. Now it's rub free, go figure!

[135Pats]

Originally Posted by dfv2

I'm on ST coils with an aggressive drop, and EC7's staggered with 245 upfront and 275's in the rear. In case you run into lower adjustment collar interference issues, here's what I did...

The fronts need to be converted to a 60mm 6" spring (went with a 450lb/in hyperco setup). This way the perch can be raised above the tire and still work with an aggressive ride height. Since the ST/KWv1's utilize the stock spring perch, you need to switch those out for a camber plate and 60mm spring perch, I went with GC street plates.

This was Eddy's original recommendations to me regarding this issue:



I rubbed quite a bit in the rear with a mild roll. I'm dropped all the way on the rear collars, no-finger-gap. Once I did the RSFB install (went with whiteline bushings) and e93 M3 bar (overkill, yes) the rubbing pretty much vanished. The RSFBs from whiteline moved the RSF down a bit, changing the camber link geometry favorably in this case. Now it's rub free, go figure!

That’s aggressive up front; I’m not at all surprised you needed a good deal of camber to keep away from the fenders. I agree a spring swap will likely be in the cards down the road, the conical springs just look like bad news. I’m not planning on much of a drop in the rear, and I can deal with some rake. The ultimate goal is to run my setup with a modest drop without camber plates or serious fender work. If I have to roll the rear fenders, so be it (though there’s very little material to roll anyways). Today I scraped on a dip driving to work, which gave me the heebee geebees. And to think I was contemplating a front lip LOL. It would be shattered within a week of DC/VA driving.

The good news is that 265 in the back has really helped grip wise. Spinning 3rd from a roll on 245s was not much fun.

[Expert@ApexWheels]

We would not recommend anything larger than a 5mm spacer in the rear with a 265/35/18 Michelin PSS unless you are planning on rolling your rear fenders. The rears fenders of the 1-series is very limiting causing a tight fit, and can cause fender clearance issues with larger spacers with the use of our wheels that were designed for the optimal 1-series fitment.

[135Pats]

Originally Posted by David@ApexRaceParts

We would not recommend anything larger than a 5mm spacer in the rear with a 265/35/18 Michelin PSS unless you are planning on rolling your rear fenders. The rears fenders of the 1-series is very limiting causing a tight fit, and can cause fender clearance issues with larger spacers with the use of our wheels that were designed for the optimal 1-series fitment.

Thanks for the response. I'm hoping to get by with 5mm in the rear with the S Drives, to my knowledge a bit more slender in profile than PSS. And to be clear, these fit 100% on stock suspension, in no way am I looking for a way to whine "these wheels don't fit". I just don't like stock ride hight

[SfValley335i]

Originally Posted by 135Pats

Thanks for the response. I'm hoping to get by with 5mm in the rear with the S Drives, to my knowledge a bit more slender in profile than PSS. And to be clear, these fit 100% on stock suspension, in no way am I looking for a way to whine "these wheels don't fit". I just don't like stock ride hight

Heres my rear setup 265 PSS with ST coilovers.



Rear of the car looking forward.



Front of the car facing the back.



rear bumper mounting tab shaved down otherwise tire would rub.


front side of the wheel/tire hitting the quarter panel, hard to see but the metal has been bent back and some paint removed by the tire contacting it...



Keep in mind you maybe able to roll the front fenders easily but the rears will mostlikely begin to flare... Another reason not to roll the rears is because the wheel well arc is 3/4 metal and 1/4 plastic (part of rear bumper), if you roll the metal part (flare it) the plastic bumper area wont have the same effect and look ugly. Shaving was easier, more clearance and no risk of flaring. Goodluck

[135Pats]

Thanks for the pictures bud, very helpful. Man PSS have a very broad profile; they look larger than they actually are. I hadn’t given enough thought RE: fender material in the back, but now that you mention it, it makes more sense to shave/cut than roll. I won’t be parting with the car for some time, so I don’t care about what that does to resale value. I was going to get them taken care of this weekend but that fell through, so looks like it’ll have to wait for a bit longer. Now I’m contemplating just waiting for the Aquamist to arrive so I can knock out a bunch of items at once.

[135Pats]

I should also add for anyone on the fence, APEX did an incredible job with these wheels. The quality is obvious, and they fit 100% no rubs no issues so long as you don’t drop the ride height like I’m doing. I’m convinced that short of HRE or Work type/cost wheels, these are the way to go for the 1.

[Bodie217]

I have the same wheels and coilovers and ran into some issues. Check out my thread - http://www.1addicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=837572

[135Pats]

Originally Posted by HomeRun217

I have the same wheels and coilovers and ran into some issues. Check out my thread - http://www.1addicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=837572

Thanks for that....even with "just" 225 up front it's very tight, so I can only imagine how tough 245 must have been.

Coils go on once i'm back in town from business, we'll see

[135Pats]

Its rubbing the strut up front with 5mm spacers. Gunna need more but then ill have fender issues. Here we go lol