Measuring 3-Piece Wheels

[a-spec.louis]

Hey all, I've found myself in a strange situation. Let's take it from the beginning...

I have a set of Work VS-XX 3 piece wheels. The original wheel specs were relatively weak, so I sought out bigger lips to widen my stance. The original width of the wheel was 18x8... the wheel had 5.5" inner barrels and 2.5" outer lips. Initially, I thought by increasing the width of the outer lip from 2.5" to 4.5" I would have a net result of a 10" wide wheel (5.5 + 4.5). I ran these wheels for a good portion of last summer and they poked a lot more than I thought they would. I had to run excessive camber and tire stretch to get them on.

Today... I made a bit of a weird discovery. For the first time I actually pulled out a measuring tape and measured end to end the actual width of the wheel and to my surprise it came out to 18x12

This leads me to believe I miscalculated how 3-piece wheels achieve their width dimensions. I guess the wheel face accounts for the extra 2 inches?

If anyone here can help shed some light on my connundrum it would be much appreciated.

[KarlSpackler]

http://www.tirerack.com/wheels/tech/techpage.jsp?techid=101

Did you hook the ouside of the wheel and measure to the other outer edge? If so, that is an 11" wheel.
Go to that site, take some pics and get back to us

[lamsv]

Also, and somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, when you buy lips the width is measured from the mounting flange to the backside of the bead seat. So, if you order a 3.5" lip, it is actually 4". When you ordered a 4.5" lip, it actually measured out to 5" based on the method you used to measure the width.

[Tuck&Poke]

Also, and somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, when you buy lips the width is measured from the mounting flange to the backside of the bead seat. So, if you order a 3.5" lip, it is actually 4". When you ordered a 4.5" lip, it actually measured out to 5" based on the method you used to measure the width.

That is true. And that can vary slightly as well, but as a rule of thumb, its approximately 1/2in.

I'm curious as to how the OP measured. Hard to say where the error is without knowing more. How did you arrive at adding two inches?

[Oh Damn, it's Sam]

I'm curious as to how the OP measured. Hard to say where the error is without knowing more. How did you arrive at adding two inches?

He used the phrase "end to end" which makes me think he's measuring the overall width, which would be wide by ≈1", as everybody has mentioned. I'm curious what's going on here as well.