Bmblbee48

Okay, I'm a woman with my first corvette. It's a 95 LT1. I have noticed that my front and rear tires are the same size (275/40ZR17). I talked with someone yesterday and they said that there vette has 17 on the front and 18 on the rear. Is it just a personal preference or is there a reason for a larger wheel/tire on the rear??? Vikki

Richard Raichert

The stock size for 95 is 255 45 17 on a 8.5 wide rim for front and 285 40 17 rear on a 9.5 inch wide rim for the rear. The previous owner might have changed the rims to use the same size tires but maybe not. The advantage of the same size tires, (only if the rims were changed) is that you can rotate them. My 94's tires can not be rotated because of different sizes and rims. Using 17" on the front and 18" on the rear is "strange". Have someone check your rim widths!

WVZR-1

Your '95 if the wheels tires weren't changed by the previous owner could be a Z07 car and so to speak "special". You could check a couple things, the Z07 RPO would appear on SPID label and the Certification Label on the drivers door would show the tire sizes front and rear matching and be 275's. If it were originally a "base car" then the 255/285 would be spec'd on the label.

I believe that '95 SPID label location is in the rear storage compartment. There would be substantial information on that label that could be valuable to you in the future.

1stvetteguy

my 95 has 285/35/17 front and 315/35/17 on the rear if I remember correctly, thats how it came when I bought it.

ghoastrider1

could be he wanted more of a "rake" stance (nose down attitude much like a drag racer) or even he thought it would give him more traction during the start of a drag race. He may have simply liked the look and got a great dea
l on the rear tire/wheel package. Welcome to the forum,BTW, its the best corvette source for info on the net.

c4cruiser

And those tires were not a "stock" size in '95. A previous owner changed them. In '95, only the ZR-1 had 315/35-17 tires in the rear and they were mounted on a 17x11 wheel.

The 285/35 is very close in size to the 275/40 so it's possible the PO got a good deal on that particular size. There should be a sticker on the driver's door that shows the tire size that came on the car.

Roys92BlackRose

My 92 has C5 Z06 reps, 17 front, 18 rear. Looks great and no issues. I'm swapping out the wheels for C5 thinline OEM to save weight though (reps are nice looking but very heavy).

Bmblbee48

Thanks for all the response, again. I found the sticker: Frt. P255/45-17 Rr. P285/40-17.

Then I found some information on the stock wheels that are on it and I think the front wheel is 9.5" wide and the rear is 11" wide. Does that sound right?

I want to buy new wheels but keep the new tires that are on it.

This site rocks!!!! Vikki

c4cruiser

No. The base suspension wheels were 8.5" wide and the rears were 9.5" wide. Unless the car is a ZR-1, the 9.5" front and 11" wide rear wheels were installed by a previous owner.

Bmblbee48

Okay, now this is a really dumb question. Can I find out how wide the wheels are without taking the tires off?

WVZR-1

You should be able to. Nearly every wheel produced has the wheel dimensions cast into the back-side of them. You just need to remove a wheel/tire and see what is cast on the back-side. There should be no need to remove a tire from the wheel. Tire stores have wheel calipers also that can be used without removing the tire. It's generally required to remove the tire/wheel to use a wheel caliper also. It can be done without but it's aggravating sometimes.

enventr

I have a 95 vert and changed wheels to ZR1 style replicas and kept the same size tires as you have all around. I can now rotate my tires

BigT2

If you want to get new wheels and keep the 275/40-17 tires just get four 17" X 9.5" wheels and you will be fine. I have them on my 96 CE LT1 from one of the vendors on this site.

T

auggy

Vikki-- what size are the front tires? what size are the rear tires? You have a couple of posts that do not agree. I can probably tell what size your wheels are by the the tire size.

enventr

The PO had 275/40-17 all around on my 95.he put 2 on an 8.5 rim which was not correct. I did get the replica ZR1 wheels with correct rim size