Car is hitting my tires.. help me....

[Z28_Medic]

I just installed 17x9.5 and 18x10.5 zo6 motorsport wheels on my 95 z28. rear tire size is 275/40zr18. It looks like when i kit bumps in the road the inner lip on my right rear fender is catching the outside of my tire. I'm about to roll the lip under to help fight the problem. I've never replaced the shocks on the car and i think it still has stock springs. is there anything i can do shock or spring wise to help fight my problem. I'm pretty sure the shocks on it are pretty worn out. Give me some ideas.

[DeWynter]

Is it only hitting on one side? If so getting an adjustable panhard bar may help to align the axle to the body better. If its hitting on both sides you may have to get a BFH and hammer in the inner fender well to clear the tires. There are a few people on the boards who have done this and can give you more info.

[Kevin - Blown 95 TA]

There should be plenty of room for 275's on the back assuming the offsets are correct. But, with wide tires, you can center the rear with an adj panhard rod like DeWynter mentioned. If you have to roll the fender lip, use a heat gun set on low to make the paint more pliable, then roll it with a wooden baseball bat.

[Injuneer]

I'm surprised the fender lip is hitting the outside of the tire... the 18x10.5" Z06 generally have an offset that puts the tire closer to the inside of the fender/liner than the outside. Do you know what offset your wheels are? The factory Z06 18x10.5" wheels have a 58mm offset, giving them an 8.00" backspace, which should not cause a problem with the fender lip.

You have also made the situation worse by using the wrong size tire.... you should have used a 275/35-18 to match the diameter of the stock tires. Your 275/40's are in inch larger than stock, so they stick up higher into the fender. Then again, I'm running 315's (but matching the factory tire diameter) on 11" wide wheels, and the fender lip only hit on extremely hard shifts, back when the car was an M6.

As noted in the post above, you may need an adjustable panhard rod, or the bushings in your panhard rod may be soft and worn out. Measure the clearance between the inner edge of the tire and the inner fender liner on both sides. If the dimension isn't the same on both sides, you need to recenter the body over the axle.