360 wheels on a 308

Suggestions based on having done this (assuming you don't want to do other suspension mods):
- 20mm Hill Engineering front spacers (I'd probably go with 25mm if I had it to do over again)
- BOLTS 10MM LONGER THAN EXPECTED for the spacers (the front brake hat on the 308 is very thick and calls for +10mm on the wheel bolt length) Going between 20mm or 25mm spacers means you'll need to figure out what's appropriate, consult with Hill Engineering or your preferred go-between, such as Ricambi America.
- 360 Front wheels
-225/45/18 front tires. MOST IMPORTANTLY makes the tire tall enough to fill more than 50% of the space between the wheel & fender! This isn't a rule of thumb, it's an absolute law to keep from having that 4 wheeler look! Also provides a little curb protection and makes the tire fit with a little more bulge over the wheel edge than standard.

- 360 rear wheels narrowed to 8.5" (maybe 8.75" if I had to do it all over again). Call James at www.weldcraftwheels.com/
- 245/45/18 rear tires (would 255 be more appropriate with a 8.75" wheel? Check tire availability for your preferred brand.)
- Standard 360 rear wheel bolts

Works darned well! (Note that this picture is with stock 215 front tires. I don't know if the spare was in place or not.) This is with stock suspension. Note that it visually shortens the rear overhang, for better or for worse.
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If you use the front wheels of the 360, it will work without the spacer. so if you can get four front wheel of the 360 you are all set as far as fitment. I think all you need to replace is the wheel bolts as the 308 wheel bolt will not work.

 

There is a way to use fronts and rears but if you want to avoid having to make custom suspensions bits you use 4 fronts. That works better anyways as you can use more appropriate tire widths, namely 225 and 245 on the same rim widths.

 

Mike, I think maybe you meant using a set of 360 REARS without spacers? The wheel face of a 360 front sits about 3/4" inside of the face of a stock 308 wheel. A 360 rear wheel face sits about 1/8" different from where the 308 wheel face is. The 360 rear (unmodified) sticks ~2-1/4" further inboard. I'm not sure that clears the suspension components.

Sorry, guys, I think what someone HAS done on here is use a set of 360 fronts with spacers, but:
1) finding 4 fronts or 4 rears is harder than finding a normal set
2) I think narrowing rears cost me about the same as spacers for the fronts
3) I wouldn't PREFER running two different width tires on the 7.5" front wheel. Note that's the narrowest size wheel allowed for 245/45/18. Ferrari didn't put the same size wheel with different size tires on their cars...

 

I had 4 355 challenge fronts on my 328 GTB and it worked great. I used 245/45 18 on the back and 225/45 on the front with no problems. I used a tire calculator and it was all very close to the stock OD. I also used a wheel offset calculator to get the exact correct offset that I needed as well.

 

See this discussion, it might help, especially any links

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=158704

 

Ah, yes, Sherpa, I don't know about the dimensions of 355 challenge wheels, or if your 328 has ABS or not. It would take a 45mm or 50mm spacer to make a regular 355 front work on a 308.

 

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=269836

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=101443

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=55962

 

It was an ABS suspension car. I used an 11mm spacer in front and none on the rear and it was perfect. I know that if you use modern wheels on the old suspensions, you need the hub extension style spacers to get the correct fit. Again, all four were fronts and they were perfect in all kinds of driving. You can use more than one width tire on the same width wheel.

 

The stock rear 8" wide. A 10" wide rim such as found on the 360 or 355 will either interfere with the stock rear spring or will stick out of the wheel well. The options to fit within the wheelwells are 1) get an aftermarket spring/shock combination that has a smaller diameter, and allows the rim to fit, 2) narrow the rear wheel, or 3) use a narrower rim (read: front rim).

In all cases a spacer will be required to fit a 308 hub to a 355/360 rim, due to the difference in offset. A late model 328 rim has a closer offset to the later rims, and requires smaller spacers.

On my car (early 328, 355 rims), I used a bolt-on spacer that attaches to the hub with its own hardware, and then the rim attaches to that hub/spacer combination just as if it were still on a 355. I don't trust welded rims, and didn't want to replace the shocks & springs, so I used 4 front rims. The front 355 rim is 7.5", and I have wider rear than front tires.

 

i have the 360 rims on my 84. I purchased spacers, but did not put them. I used 4- 360 front rims with the 360 bolts. Car drives fine, no problems with steering, but if you track it the spacers should help in handling a little better. My front is a little high, because i have no spare.
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What Tillman said in his first paragraph.
- Leaving the wheel at stock width and bolting a spacer on will make it stick out of the rear fender.
- Leaving the wheel at stock width and bolting it to the hub will make it hit the spring. This can be overcome by switching to aftermarket springs/shocks that are a smaller diameter. There are quite some number of threads here on popular conversions using QA1 shocks and the modifications required for that pursuit.
- Narrowing the wheel takes width out of the back of the wheel to prevent interference. I know there are those that are wary of having the wheel modified. I'm not going to argue that point, but I believe these guys at Weldcraft have done thousands of wheels over quite some number of years, including several 308 owners from here on fchat. I don't know what their failure rate is, but my friends and I have raced and street driven on Weldcraft-modified wheels with no more problems than one small porosity that leaked (and was sealed with a whack with a punch & hammer). I learned of them based on word that one of the Big 3 had some prototype wheels reworked there.

 

See post #13 that was I was talking about all 4 are front wheels, rear ones are too wide.

 

I fail to understand how people are running 360 fronts without spacers.
Does your wheel not sit ~3/4" inboard of your old wheels?!!? Does the steering not feel much different from before since you've altered the scrub radius by ~3/4"? (That's based on a first approximation of scrub radius, doesn't take change in tire diameter into account.)

Wheel_____Dia__Width_Offset____Backspace__Frontspace_Delta Scrub
308_______14___7.5__11________4.18_______3.32______0.0
360 Front__18___7.5__31.5______4.99_______2.51______-20.5
20mm Space18___7.5__11.5______4.20_______3.30______-0.5

These calculations are the reason I've selected the configuration above.
Since everyone talks like the wheels are interchangeable from 14"->TRX->16", I'm having to assume the QV wheel geometry is the same as my 78 (which it may not be, feel free to provide numbers for the 16" wheels if I'm wrong).

 

I have 4-360 rears available.

 

I'm telling you, you don't need the rear wheels of the 360, if you do, you will need to use the spacers because without it, it will rub against the suspension because it's too wide. The last thing you want to do is use a spacer specially if you're going to track your car.

 

Dominic,
that 360 fronts without spacers question was directed at you...
Don't your wheels sit tucked in under the car? Compared to a 7.5" 308 wheel (14") the front (and back) of the 7.5" 360 wheel sit ~3/4" inboard of the 308 wheel. That should make the car look like it's hulking over the wheels and it will alter your steering feel by changing the scrub radius.

As for "needing" the 360 rears, it can certainly be done with all fronts. And, of course, as documented above, I'm not using spacers, I reworked the wheels. "You shouldn't use spacers for track use" is a whole different discussion that I don't care to get into ATM.

SO, to answer enzone's original question, there's a whole bunch of words here now to sort through. I laid out what I did on my '78. I presented the math it was based on so as to keep the wheel centerline in about the same spot as the factory wheel to avoid changing your scrub radius much and changing your steering feel too much. That same math also gives an idea how to keep the track width the same for handling and to keep the wheel face from being pushed inboard so your car won't look like a ballerina in a tutu. I've also offered up a RULE for putting low profile tires on a car: the tire needs to take up MORE THAN 50% of the space between the wheel lip and the fender to avoid the 4x4 look. Other people have presented other solutions.
What should be clear is that you CAN'T bolt the rear wheel straight onto the car. So you have to make you first big decision about what path you want to take to handle that. Go all fronts? Rework the wheel? Install a new suspension? Scrap the plan? If you proceed past that point, you just need to remember to get longer wheel bolts for the fronts and can always add the front spacers later if you're hoping you don't need them...

 

Hi Guys,

Here is a link to how i did it. with the help of friends:

http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=101443&highlight=wheels

chris

 

Best to leave the car stock wheeled. It drives fine with stock wheels. I will never put anything else on. Alot of my friends took the alloy wheels off their 1960's Ferrari's and put wire wheels on them. Now they have lost or sold the original wheels and have problems with originality.

Just my opinion (it hasn't changed since 1968).

 

the wheels Ferraris come with anyways look better on other models. Stock blasphemy ! Never

 

it is not like you can't put originals back on... if they lost them oh well I guess they didn't care much anyway.

I like my 360 wheels on my 328... and I don't need you to tell me I can't do as I please. It drives fine on 360 wheels.

You keep yours anyway you want... I won't spend a lot of time worrying over it.
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The hill engineering spacers are hub centric, that is they center on the center lip of the hub AND they have a corresponting lip to center the wheel and take the shear load.

I have no worries tracking with this spacer set up or with a welded, (narrowed) rear wheel.

Back to the spacer for a minute. I rapidly got tired of trying to balance the spacer on the hub and trying to line it up with the wheel and trying to get the first bolt in. I had them on and off a lot doing the brake work, so i had the machinist partially drill out two of the holes, so i could install a washer and small met ric allen in the two hub holes that have those funny pointed disc attaching bolts. Now, the spacer stays on and aligned.

I would recommend caution using wider than 20 mm spacers and lowering the car because even with a 225/40-18 tire it is still possible to hit the fender with the tire on going into gas stations.

One of my main reasons to go with the 18 inch 360 wheel, apart from appearance was to fit better brakes, fronts are F-50 discs, (14 inch x 32 mm) and F-50 calipers. The rears are 13 inch with 360 parking brake and main caliper.
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These are the wheels you want. All set for 308 and 328. Just get the right spacers for your model but these are the wheels that fit.


http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/vbclassified.php?do=ad&id=10763