Debating the switch to 18 inch wheels from the 20 inch inductions

[Jeff Schank]

Hello all,

I have 45K miles on my original 20 inch induction wheels/goodyear tires on my 2020 Model Y. I do a ton of road trips year round (Wisconsin) and am looking to maximize my range. I have settled on Hankook Ion Evo AS SUV tires as they seem to be the best balance of range/performance/price/etc.

My question is do I just stay with the 20 inch inductions and swap the tires or switch to 18 inch RTX rims at discount tires and get these hankook tires. They only offer 235/60/18 107 or 225/60/18 104. Will this tire size negate the potential range increase swapping down to 20's?

Has anyone put 18 inch hankook tires on their model y? if so what are they seeing in terms of Wh/mi?

Thanks in advance,

 

[TomServo]

I swapped from the 21" UT to 18" from TSportLine.

My lifetime wh/mil is 276 and over half of my 16K miles are from road trips at HIGHWAY speeds. Here's my data from our Christmas road trip from southern IL to southern MD from Dec 21st to the 27th, highway speeds, and winter temps.

The 18s are so much better on our DD MYP.

Around town, I average 250 wh/mi. No more fear of potholes/curbs, it rides better and I can rotate them. For us it's a WIN-WIN-WIN-WIN situation.

And it's faster

 

[TesLEEZ]

I'm swapping to Tsportline 18's, Eagle tires are garbage in the snow. I'll probably start with the Michilin All Season 4's.

The main reason I'm going with Tsportline are that the wheels are properly machined for the Tesla hub, no need for any center bore adapters. Most aftermarket rims are designed to be universal, so they typically spec them for the largest center bore size and make everyone use plastic center bore adapters. Some shops install them without center bore ring adapters, which is crazy to me. Tesla's also have a little chamfer cut into the center bore of the hub as well, the Tsportline rims are cut perfectly to match. Here's a link for reference with pictures: NEW MODEL Y 18 inch at Tsportline?!

Here's a comparison of your rim and tires if you decide to find used Model 3 rims: Rim & Tire Size Calculator. Custom Offsets

 

[Jeff Schank]

Yes moving to 18's seems to be the best move for many reasons. Would it be a reasonable assumption that moving to 18 inch model 3 Aero wheels post 2021 (750 KG Load) with aero covers and these Hankook Ion EVO AS SUV Tires 225/60/18 would be the most highway efficient setup I could find? Walmart has those hankooks at 180/each so its very tempting. any other considerations? will a 225 tire look ridiculous on a model y? will i be more susceptible to potholes or hydroplaning? I cant really get much worse in snow than my current goodyears/20's.

 

[TesLEEZ]

Yes moving to 18's seems to be the best move for many reasons. Would it be a reasonable assumption that moving to 18 inch model 3 Aero wheels post 2021 (750 KG Load) with aero covers and these Hankook Ion EVO AS SUV Tires 225/60/18 would be the most highway efficient setup I could find? Walmart has those hankooks at 180/each so its very tempting. any other considerations? will a 225 tire look ridiculous on a model y? will i be more susceptible to potholes or hydroplaning? I cant really get much worse in snow than my current goodyears/20's.

The only other consideration is towing, if you want the full 3500lbs tow rating, you need to use the 19" model Y rims and tires. Even the upgraded 20's are capable of towing the full 3500lbs. If you don't tow, then there's no need to worry about it.

I believe the 18's are 8.5" wide, unlike the normal 8" wide rim. 225 may or may not be wide enough for an 8.5" rim. I would have to do research on that.

 

[badiban]

I swapped from the 21" UT to 18" from TSportLine.

My lifetime wh/mil is 276 and over half of my 16K miles are from road trips at HIGHWAY speeds. Here's my data from our Christmas road trip from southern IL to southern MD from Dec 21st to the 27th, highway speeds, and winter temps.

The 18s are so much better on our DD MYP.

Around town, I average 250 wh/mi. No more fear of potholes/curbs, it rides better and I can rotate them. For us it's a WIN-WIN-WIN-WIN situation.

And it's faster

How bad is the speedometer and odometer offset?

 

[Jeff Schank]

I do not tow. Discount tire said the 8.5 inch model 3 wheels are too wide for the 225 tires so yes I will need to either use the Hankook Ion 235/60/18 and deal with speedometer error or go with a different tire that has a 235/55/18 option.

I wonder what range differences there would be between 18 inch M3 aero wheels with covers with 235/60/18 hankooks and 19 inch gemini wheels with covers and hankook ion 255/45/19

 

[TomServo]

How bad is the speedometer and odometer offset?

ZERO if I'm to believe BEFORE and AFTER testing using my DRAGY. The car and GPS are within ONE MILE of each other, the before had a 3 mph delta. With the BEFORE (OEM ties/wheels) if the car said 70 mph my GPS reported 67 mph.

 

[Farmer]

I had some General Altimax Arctic 12 winter tires sized 225/60R18, 104T that were virtually brand new, leftover from my RAV4 Prime. I wanted to go to 18" for pothole protection, etc. and when I saw that these tires had the same 104 load range as my MYLR OEM 19", I got some Enkei Performance Victory wheels, 18x8" that enabled me to mate the tires to my MYLR. They do have a slight diameter/circumference increase over the OEM 19" with the Conti Contact Pros of around 2.1 percent. This means that they rotate slower and under-report speed and distance. However, it turns out that the OEM 19s were over-reporting judging by 2 GPS devices and the slight size increase of my 18" setup has made the speedometer and GPS spot on with each other. 70mph on the speedometer is now 70mph GPS versus 72.5ish previously. This also means that my reported efficiency went down a bit since the OEM Contis falsely over-report on distance traveled (inflating efficiency numbers), but now my distance and efficiency reported by the car are more accurate.

That said, my efficiency numbers are about the same, 284ish for the past 2 months compared to 270ish before, but it's also *much* colder now, so I think that, if I ran these 225/60R18 size in the warm weather, I'd see an efficiency increase, which is to be expected since the tires represent a 30mm narrower profile being pushed along.

The Arctic 12s in my 225 size, are spec'ed for a maximum 8" wide rim by General so I suspect many/most other 225-wide tires have 8" for a maximum wheel width. If one wants an 8.5" rim width, 235mm tread seems to be the minimum to cover such a wheel.

I myself am loving the 225/60 tires, especially in loose snow and slush as they fon't hydroplane and slushplane as much as a 255 tread would. They ride softer as well. Steering response is slightly slower and not quite as crisp, but I find the steering response of low profile and ultra-low-profile tire/wheel setups to be too unnecessarily touchy anyhow.

 

[Jeff Schank]

@Farmer This has been very helpful. Thank you all for the responses. How did you find the Enkei wheels and who did you have do install? Would I need a 45 offset and other similar metrics like the original lnduction wheels? I am thinking about using discount tire for wheels/mounting tires since they will price match 180/tire on these hankooks and its down the street from me.

 

[MODEL+]

Speaking of Enkei... any one want to try Enkei Overalnder wheel? Available in 18x8 +35 that will work with Model 3/Y

Let me know!


-Danny

 

[mborkow]

ZERO if I'm to believe BEFORE and AFTER testing using my DRAGY. The car and GPS are within ONE MILE of each other, the before had a 3 mph delta. With the BEFORE (OEM ties/wheels) if the car said 70 mph my GPS reported 67 mph.

Speedometers are set 3 to 5% fast by manufacturers for warranty purposes

 

[Jeff Schank]

Alright I am probably going to purchase Hankook Ion Evo AS SUV Tires 225/60/18 with liquid metal shadow wheels from discount tire. Price matched to walmart the tires are 180/each and wheels 175/each plus lugnuts/install/etc comes out to like 1650. Purchasing 255/40/20 hankooks for my 20 inch inductions would be 338+ per tire plus install so I am getting pretty close to breaking even by downsizing the tire/wheels plus the obvious gains in range, comfort, winter performance, and cheaper tires at future replacements. Seems like a win/win. I will probably keep the inductions/beat up goodyears to put back on if I ever decide to sell the car in the future. Thank you everyone for your input

 

[Discount Tire]

Alright I am probably going to purchase Hankook Ion Evo AS SUV Tires 225/60/18 with liquid metal shadow wheels from discount tire. Price matched to walmart the tires are 180/each and wheels 175/each plus lugnuts/install/etc comes out to like 1650. Purchasing 255/40/20 hankooks for my 20 inch inductions would be 338+ per tire plus install so I am getting pretty close to breaking even by downsizing the tire/wheels plus the obvious gains in range, comfort, winter performance, and cheaper tires at future replacements. Seems like a win/win. I will probably keep the inductions/beat up goodyears to put back on if I ever decide to sell the car in the future. Thank you everyone for your input

Thank you for your business! Thank you for taking advantage of our Low Price Guarantee, It gives piece of mind knowing you are getting the best price.

 

[TomServo]

Speedometers are set 3 to 5% fast by manufacturers for warranty purposes

I didn't know it was for "warranty" reasons, but I prefer my car to display a more accurate speed.

 

[Farmer]

@Farmer This has been very helpful. Thank you all for the responses. How did you find the Enkei wheels and who did you have do install? Would I need a 45 offset and other similar metrics like the original lnduction wheels? I am thinking about using discount tire for wheels/mounting tires since they will price match 180/tire on these hankooks and its down the street from me.

I found them on TireRack.com I have found Tire Rack to be very helpful on their website and phone over the years. Tire Rack provides a list of local installers when you order. They send the wheels/tires there and schedule a local appointment at the installer of your choice with you at checkout if you want. I simply showed up with my tires and new TPMS hardware that I had gotten off of Amazon and my local Monroe auto center did the rest.

The wheels I used had a +40 offset compared to the OEM +45. That moves the inside of the wheel/tire 5mm closer towards the car, but since the new wheels were 8" wide vs. stock 9.5" and the tread was only 225mm compared to 255 stock, overall the tires had an additional 10mm of space on the inside since the tires were 30mm narrower, 15mm of that going getting taken away from the inside edge, then minus 5mm offset.

Yes, when doing different wheels and tires, one does have to check the math and geometry closely.

I should add that at first, Monroe didn't want to work on my Tesla as they didn't have the pucks to lift it, but when I mentioned that I had a set, they were happy to use them.

 

[Farmer]

I didn't know it was for "warranty" reasons, but I prefer my car to display a more accurate speed.

I thought it was done so as to help keep people from getting speeding tickets. Seriously.

The thing is, if the car is over-reporting speed and distance due to tires being ever so incrementally too small in circumference, it ends up artificially inflating the efficiency W/mi numbers, since the car *appears* to be traveling a percent or two further on a given KWh than it actually does.

I likewise, prefer to see a more accurate speed and distance.

 

[Midnightsun]

I also made the same switch from 20" inductions to 18" wheels, went with RTX Spiders, no regrets. Even have the 19" flavour square set up on the S for winter wheels and another 19" set on the Y for winter wheels. The oldest set is on the Y which is on it's 4th salt infested winter which still look like new.

 

[badiban]

I also made the same switch from 20" inductions to 18" wheels, went with RTX Spiders, no regrets. Even have the 19" flavour square set up on the S for winter wheels and another 19" set on the Y for winter wheels. The oldest set is on the Y which is on it's 4th salt infested winter which still look like new.

Got pics of how the Spiders look on your MY? Did you have to adjust the suspension at all?

 

[Midnightsun]

Got pics of how the Spiders look on your MY? Did you have to adjust the suspension at all?

See here