Possible change of tyre width?

mdaw1985

Active Member
Aug 3, 2008
227
27
St.Leonards, East Sussex
Hi all,

My wife has a 63 plate 1.4 Ibiza Toca which runs an unusual tyre size being 215/45/16

I've not come across many cars with that width of tyre and have found in general her tyres are more expensive than my 225/40/18 tyres on my exeo. Assuming the reason is that my tyres are more common than hers?

Would it be ok to switch to a 205 width on her car like my old mk4 ibiza had? They are much cheaper. Im assuming they would fit the rims fine but would it mess up the handling or tracking?
 

RUM4MO

Active Member
Jun 4, 2008
7,784
983
South Scotland
One thing to consider, VW Group will have homologated these cars with a range of wheel/tyres sizes, and that is what insurers would expect to find used on these cars, so if you did change to a more commonly used tyre size, you would need to tell your insurance company about that change.

My wife's August 2015 Polo 1.2TSI 110PS SEL also uses that tyre size, so you might find that prices will drop a bit as that size becomes more commonly used, that is what happened when I ran a VX Cav GSI 4X4 as it had 205/?? X 16 - each time I replaced the tyres they cost less!

Just in case you did not know, there is a site that lists rim widths versus acceptable tyre widths.
 
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