New wheels & tires --

I purchased a new set of Rota Slipstream wheels and Hankook tires (205-50-15) for my 2016 Spark EV. I will put the OEM wheels & tires in storage to return with the car at the end of the lease (assuming I choose to return it). In any event, it has just occurred to me that I may need to add new TPMS sensors. Found these at O'Reilly for about $56 each. (Schrader AfterMarket - Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) Sensor) There is a similar product at the tire rack for $36 each.

Anyone have any experience with replacing or installing new TPMS sensors? Would there be any negative effects by running without TPMS?

The TR version works fine. You also need a special tool to tell the car about the new sensors (or go to a mechanic each time you change wheels), which TR can also provide.

Leafless said:

I purchased a new set of Rota Slipstream wheels and Hankook tires (205-50-15) for my 2016 Spark EV. I will put the OEM wheels & tires in storage to return with the car at the end of the lease (assuming I choose to return it). In any event, it has just occurred to me that I may need to add new TPMS sensors. Found these at O'Reilly for about $56 each. (Schrader AfterMarket - Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) Sensor) There is a similar product at the tire rack for $36 each.

Anyone have any experience with replacing or installing new TPMS sensors? Would there be any negative effects by running without TPMS?

Click to expand...

When I went square http://2014chevysparkev.blogspot.com/2016/07/el-blue-goes-square.html, I bought 4 of these:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00O9H0QIG/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1.

And this:

https://www.amazon.com/Kent-Moore-E...g_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3BNWJV2HEB57AAVNNBEN.

From my notes: TPMS sensors 315mHz; GM part # 13581558

I ended up not using the tool, as the tire shop did the TPMS reprogramming. I *did* get to watch the entire swap and asked questions about the tire sensors. The technicians were happy that I had done my homework and purchased the correct sensors. :mrgreen:

Damn horn beeps with each sensor confirmation.

-Bob K.

Bob: Thanks for the info. I had planned on ordering these:
https://tpms247.com/products/tpms-sensor-2016-chevrolet-spark-im4083?variant=20063619269

The brand name is "EON" and the part number cross references with the GM part numbers.

Even though they are a little more expensive, the bright stems and caps would probably look better with the full polished Rota Slipstream wheels.

Update: Bought these and they work fine.

Everything has been installed. I went with the new TPMS listed above which cost about $27.50 each shipped. Matching the TPMS sensors to the car was easy... took about three minutes to complete. I had to add a 5mm spacer to each front wheel to clear the caliper. Ordered these on eBay for about $16 shipped: http://www.ebay.com/itm/161968101445?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

I was able to use the original lug nuts. The lug nuts will center the wheels so long as you use a typical 4 bolt tightening sequence.

Looks great and there is no rubbing whatsoever. Pictures will follow.

Leafless: I'd like to do the same thing - what exact size and offset Rotas did you buy?

Are they they 15x6.5" 40mm on eBay?

And what are you using for centering rings, and front spacers?

Here's a parts summary for anyone else interested in these inexpensive 12.5 lb. wheels. They take off 6 lbs/corner, which will improve ride and handling noticeably.

Wheels: http://www.ebay.com/itm/302057196901

Front 5mm spacers: http://www.ebay.com/itm/161968101445

Centering rings: http://us.hubcentric-rings.com/size-67.1-56.6/

Blank center caps, if you don't like Rota's. Spray any color or put a bowtie sticker on them: http://www.ebay.com/itm/4x-New-70mm-67mm-Wheel-Center-Hub-Caps-Without-Logo-/331386435961

Tires - Up to you - Leafless is using 205x50x15 on all four. Short-term, I'm going to try 205 Front and 195 Rear.

EldRitch said:

Here's a parts summary for anyone else interested in these inexpensive 12.5 lb. wheels. They take off 6 lbs/corner, which will improve ride and handling noticeably.

Wheels: http://www.ebay.com/itm/302057196901

Front 5mm spacers: http://www.ebay.com/itm/161968101445

Centering rings: http://us.hubcentric-rings.com/size-67.1-56.6/

Blank center caps, if you don't like Rota's. Spray any color or put a bowtie sticker on them: http://www.ebay.com/itm/4x-New-70mm-67mm-Wheel-Center-Hub-Caps-Without-Logo-/331386435961

Tires - Up to you - Leafless is using 205x50x15 on all four. Short-term, I'm going to try 205 Front and 195 Rear.

Click to expand...

Don't forget the TPMS sensors. And, I went with the 205-50-15 tires on F & R so that they can be easily rotated from front to rear.

EldRitch said:

Here's a parts summary for anyone else interested in these inexpensive 12.5 lb. wheels. They take off 6 lbs/corner, which will improve ride and handling noticeably.

Wheels: http://www.ebay.com/itm/302057196901

Front 5mm spacers: http://www.ebay.com/itm/161968101445

Centering rings: http://us.hubcentric-rings.com/size-67.1-56.6/

Blank center caps, if you don't like Rota's. Spray any color or put a bowtie sticker on them: http://www.ebay.com/itm/4x-New-70mm-67mm-Wheel-Center-Hub-Caps-Without-Logo-/331386435961

Tires - Up to you - Leafless is using 205x50x15 on all four. Short-term, I'm going to try 205 Front and 195 Rear.

Click to expand...

Nice! Pictures!!! :mrgreen:

Installation and pix in a couple of days. I've also got some Chevy center caps coming from eBay that may fit the Rotas. (http://www.ebay.com/itm/271525590537) Plenty of used ones available cheap.

I've also ordered a set of stick-on stickers that fit the center-caps supplied with the Rota wheels instead of the Rota logo. They are silver bow-tie on black. I'm thinking they will look good, now that I sprayed the Rota fake-carbon-fiber caps gloss black. The guy made up this size special on request - check it out: http://www.ebay.com/itm/222261533127

I've currently got staggered tires on OEM wheels - 195x50 F, 205x50 R. Since the front tires are the ones that need more traction, I'm going to try the reverse stagger, with the 205s in front, and the 195s on the back.

Wheels going on tomorrow, with 205x50 in front, and 195x50 rear, using Rota Slipstreams with brushed-aluminum Chevy S10 Blazer center cap, P/N 15661129:

I didn't care for the look of the black Rota center caps on the polished wheels, but these make the wheels look like a factory option, IMHO.

The Chevy center cap is intended for a hole a couple of mm smaller than the 67.1mm center bore of the Rota wheel, but I was able to use a small pliers and bend the legs outward to give a snap-in fit, and I'll use a couple of dabs of silicone rubber to attach it to the wheel.

Big call-out for Leafless on this - he led me to this combination. And here are the wheels installed with the Blazer center caps:





With the these wheels and the 5mm spacers in front, my Dunlop Direzza DZ102 fit fine, with either 195/50 or 205/50, so I'm using my 195/50 at the back, where they lower it by 1cm vs. stock. The 205s at the front give a nice improvement in traction over even the 195s, and balance out the understeer a bit. I'll probably put 205s on the back when I need to, so I could rotate the tires fore and aft.

Since I transferred the 1000-mile tires I had on the OEM wheels, I can directly compare the wheels:

- The Rotas take a Lot of bump out of the bumps and potholes - the whole suspension feels more sophisticated, the ride is less jarring, and they are a bit quieter as well, since less shock is transmitted to the frame. In the long run, the reduction in unsprung weight and impact will also keep interior ticks and clicks noises down.
This is the biggest result of this upgrade - I've done similar wheels upgrades on several cars, and this is more of an improvement in ride comfort than a very similar wheel swap on my Mini S, perhaps because the Spark is a lighter car.

- Cornering traction on bumpy pavement is improved. It could be the 205-195 swap in combination with reduced unsprung mass (6 lbs/wheel is a lot on this car), but the car has more grip, thus less understeer when cornering, so you can put a bit more power down. It also feels like the lowered tail-end may have added benefits in cornering.

- Acceleration and braking - not so much. I'd guess the reduced rotational inertia might get you to 60mph .1/second sooner, but that's about it, based on some tests written up by Grassroots Motorsports a few years ago. The rough rule of thumb on wheel weight is that 1 lb. reduction in wheel weight is equivalent to 3-4 lbs. reduction in car weight, so the equivalent of maybe 80-90 lbs. less isn't going to make a huge difference. Reduced unsprung weight does keep the tires on the ground better, so the dreaded traction-control light does not come on as often when accelerating on imperfect pavement, and that might buy you a little more.

Worth $440 shipped? To me, it is, as it makes the car feel considerably less cheap, while improving some key aspects of ride and handling. Oh yeah, and I think the wheels sure look nice - all the car needs now is a huge wing at the back...

And digging into this a little further, I noticed that with the 195 on the back and 205 on the front, the rear wheels looked a little too inset, so I put the remaining two 5mm spacers on the back for appearance.

When I did so, I counted the threads on the stock lugnuts that are engaged when using this spacer, and found that it still has 6-1/2 threads into the nuts, with a 12x1.5mm thread, so this 5mm spacer should be "safe" for street use according to the most sources - longer studs not mandatory. Do use a hand torque wrench to avoid over-tightening.

The cheap ebay spacers I bought are a fairly sloppy fit (about 1.5mm too large a center bore), so I went looking and found custom wheel spacers available. They can be made hub-centric to the hub, and also bore-centric to the wheel, thus taking the place of centering rings and giving the best-possible fit for least vibration.
http://www.motorsport-tech.com/4DCGI/wheel_spacers

Eld,

Thanks for posting your wheel/tire/spacer upgrade ! This looks like a great way to go, except for the "6 1/2 threads" of engagement... What about a 3mm spacer? Clearance at the front strut?
I can believe with stickier 205 tires you really can feel the difference.

A friend on Maui has been telling me she thinks she's seen Spark EV's locally.
Are you one of those? The pictures sure look like you could be there!

Mahalo !

edit: I zoomed and see the Oregon tree.... Oh well...

Lots of opinions about lug-nut minimum thread engagement on the net. Here are a couple:
http://www.maximummotorsports.com/tech_wheels_spacers.aspx
http://adaptitusa.com/wheellugnuttorquing.aspx

BTW, the Rotas are $440 for the set of four, shipped, and they showed up in three days.

In regards to 'number of engaged threads' when installing wheel lug nut onto stud -

SAE recommendation is that you have a minimum thread engagement of the diameter of the vehicle stud -
Example: if stud is 12.5mm in Diameter, there should be sufficient thread grip depth/length equal to or greater than 12.5mm.
Similar story if using 14mm studs; 14mm+ length of thread engagement.

Some info:

http://www.performanceplustire.com/tech.info/A-Few-Facts-About-Lug-Nuts

http://www.mcgard.com/index.php/customer-service/installationremoval


According to the notes on Tire Rack, 6.5 turns for a 12mmx1.5mm stud is sufficient.
http://www.tirerack.com/wheels/tech/techpage.jsp?techid=99&

bryan

Here is a photo of my Spark with the new Rota Slipstream wheels. I will probably paint the calipers black so that the silver color doesn't conflict with the wheels.


And here are the details:
Wheels:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/302057196901?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Note: these have a fairly large hub center bore which is typical of this manufacturer (sort of a "one size fits all" thing). Given the conical shape of the lug nuts, the wheels seem to have centered just fine. However, I might be interested in centering rings.

Wheel spacers:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/161968101445?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

The spacers I ordered were specifically for a 4x100 application. The 5mm spacer is about 0.2" thick. I tried a universal set of 1/4" thick spacers and while they worked, the overall diameter of the spacer was greater than the diameter of the inner mounting surface of the wheel, and as such, looked a bit dorky.

Tires:
http://www.discounttiredirect.com/direct/findTireDetail.do?ra=searchTiresBySize.do&fl=&pc=19441&counter=0&ar=50&rd=15&cs=205

Note: With a UTQG of 500 AA-A these should be relatively long mileage tires. They are listed as "fuel efficient" which I was told is somewhat akin to "low rolling resistance" which is good for the Spark EV. I picked the 205-50-15 because the overall diameter is exactly the same as the original 185-55-15 tire that came on the front of the car. On the rear, the car will sit about 0.2" lower as the diameter is about 0.4" less than the original (195-55-15) rear tires.

TPMS:
https://tpms247.com/collections/2015-chevrolet-spark/products/tpms-sensor-2015-chevrolet-spark-im4083?variant=20063589445

Note: Unless you are saving your original tires & wheels for a lease return (or for any other reason), you could use the existing TPMS sensors. I also believe that if properly located (e.g. RF to RF, etc.) you would not need to reset the sensors although doing so is relatively easy with the proper tool.