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-   -   Honda Civic : Tyre & wheel upgrade thread (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/tyre-alloy-wheel-section/26758-honda-civic-tyre-wheel-upgrade-thread-14.html)

Some snaps of the upgrade to Turanza 205 65 R15.

Wheel wells filled very well, car having a much more planted look

Dinu, Thanks indeed. Looks neat.

@Dinu: The new tires look good. Can you provide some feedback on the suspension and ride quality and most importantly the under body scraping on speed breakers ?

How much did this exercise cost you and did you get anything at all for your old tires? Thanks.

Ride quality is better due to the increased sidewall. The GC has increased by 6mm which is really useful. I am able to take speedbreakers at a higher speed than before without scraping. I also took five people on board and drove around. No issues at all. As I had mentioned in my earlier post, the tires were 4450 a piece plus balancing anf fitment. Nothing for old tires because of the uncommon size (195 65 15) and age. It had run 24000km.
Overall extremely happy with the upgrade as it has addressed my major two areas - Looks and GC. FE is somethin I need to see. First observations does not seem to point to any drop.
Highly recommended for all Civics - 205 65 R15. Of course I do not drive at the limits to test the handling at the edge, so this is something I cannot comment.

Thanks for the update. Do keep udating on the FE figures as that would be an important factor as well. Also, do you experience any speedo error due to this upgrade ? I know you have stuck to the stock rims but still am not sure if the speedo readings would be the same as before.

Speedo error has nothing to do with stock rims or not. It depends on the overall diameter of the wheel, i.e. alloy + tire included, which in this case has changed. There will be slight reduction in the speed shown in the speedo (and kms on Odo) vs stock values. This also needs to be factored in FE calculation to get correct values. However that said, these changed are quite minimal and can be ignored, unless you are into details.

Circumference of Old tire = 199.334 cm
Circumference of New tire = 203.418 cm
variation = 2%

So speedo will show 2 kmph less than stock (at 100kmph) and odo distance will be 2% less too. In real life there are many other factors, hence this can be ignored.

Rightly said. Just add 2% to all values, speed, distance travelled , FE etc

@ Dinu, Thanks indeed for the feedback and updates. This is great

@ST7677 and @ Dinu... If you read official tests of Civic, the Speedo error reported by all Testers (Autocar, TopGear and Overdrive) was around 3%. It showed 100 kmph when the actual speed was 97 kmph on stock tires.

Hence this upgrade will negate that and will show closer to true reading. Any thoughts?

Thanks for all the inputs and updates. Whilst the speedo error is something that we can/cannot live with, is there a way that the odo/speedo can be corrected to match the new tire size ?

I would say this is probably not worth the effort. Even with the stock tires there are errors to the extent of 3% as mentioned by Naresh. And even if you closely check two brands of tires with the same specs, the heights vary to a small extent.

Quite possible... possibly 205 65 15 is the ideal sizeclap:

I agree it is not worth the trouble but just wanted to understand if that re-calibration is possible or not.:)

I would be more interested in knowing the impact of the tyre upgrade on the FE bit. Please chime in with your updates on that one. Thanks.

This is due to localization effect - the civic in US comes with 16" wheels so when it got localized for India, Honda probably reduced the wheel size and along with also changed the tyre spec impacting the overall diameter to be slightly smaller.
This is well within the 3% acceptable norm, so nothing wrong with it. However 205/65/15 is probably the ideal size for the car and Honda should make this as OE size. It will also address the GC issues.

Dinu, waiting to hear some more detailed feedback from you, i.e. after initial run in period is over. Also any impact on FE, if at all.

Finally, my update on the FE. Today morning I filled her up, my first full tank after the upgrade. I had filled her earlier immediately after the tire upgrade. So, this tank was run totally on the upgraded tires. She ran 244 kms and took in 24.16lit before auto cutoff. That translates to 10.1 km/lit. I should say I'm elated that there is no perceptible drop in FE after the upgrade. The run was totally representative of my normal routes in the city with around 50% AC and this is the normal mileage I have been used to in these cycles. So, clap::Cheering:
Yes, this is the ideal upsize..... with respect to GC, looks and FE

Sounds great ! Even the marginal decrease in FE (if any) will be negated by the improved GC and the planted feel of the car. Keep checking the FE figures for a few more times and confirm if it settles down at the same level. Congrats !

OT: I understand you are flying high (seeing the amount of smilies) but you may get on the mods radar for the same. (Only two smilies per post are allowed):)