Front Centre Bore Diameter

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Meridian

New member
Joined
Dec 4, 2021
Messages
2
Location
Ontario, Canada
I purchased a 2017 i-MiEV earlier this year and have been trying to find an extra set of wheels for snow tires. I've done a bunch of reading in this forum and others. I read that that the front centre bore is 56.1mm, but it can be reduced to 54.1mm (to match the rear) if the pressed in collar is removed. Based on this, I purchased a set of 15x5 54.1mm centre bore alloys from a Prius c. They're 39mm offset instead of 35mm, but my hope is that they'll be close enough. If a 4mm spacer is required, then I'm again hoping that it wouldn't be so much as to require pressing in longer studs.

The Prius c alloys mount on the rear nicely as expected, but, even with the collar removed, they won't mount on the front. The collar is actually a smaller diameter than the hub. The hub isn't the same diameter the whole way back to the rotor and gets smaller close to the rotor. It's hard to measure it due to the studs, but I think it's 54.1mm close to the rotor.

Does anyone know if there was a change in the later years of production for the front hub? Any suggestions on fitting these wheels to the front?

In case it helps anyone, I noticed that the lug nuts on the i-MiEV aren't compatible with the Prius c wheels. I picked up a new set of lug nuts from the local Toyota dealer. The Prius c are a "mag" style, but the ones on my i-MiEV with the factory alloys are cone.

Another thing that others may find helpful to know is that Tirerack has OEM fitment "Radius" wheels for the i-MiEV right now. They are 15x5/35mm offset/54.1mm centre bore and 15x4/35mm offset/56.1mm centre bore. The centre bores aren't listed on the site, but I emailed Tirerack support and they confirmed they are the correct bore. I didn't go this route because I'm in Canada and the cost is quite high to get them into the country. I also like the look of the Prius c wheels more.
 
Meridian, welcome to the forum and thank you for this good information. When I first got my i-MiEV I half-heartedly attempted to remove the collar on the front spindle but decided to wait until after the warranty expired and never got around to it.

To answer your question, I'm not aware of any changes to the wheels in the North American versions 2012-2017. Anyone else?

Question for you:
There has been some debate as to whether the 2017 model year was really produced for North America, or whether the cars were carry-over 2016 models. What happens if you enter your car VIN into this Mitsu website (recognizing this is US and not Canadian)?
https://www.mitsubishicars.com/rs/file/monroney?vin=JA3215H16CU018997
Just replace that VIN with yours.

BTW, it's always fun to know where in the world someone is located, as we occasionally find other i-MiEV owners close to us. You might consider updating your profile (which will show your location by your username whenever you post), the procedure described here: http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=3196
 
To mount wheels which require a larger center bore, it's not terribly expensive to have the wheel put in a lathe and have the center bore machined to whatever diameter you require. I did not have to do this with my iMiEV when I mounted BMW Mini wheels, but not wanting to use spacers, I did have the two front wheels put in a lathe and 1/2" cut out of them and then rewelded so the front pair are 5 inch width wheels and the rears are still the stock 5.5" from the Mini

I had a couple sets of beautiful BBS basket weave wheels from an RX-7 machined to go on both my Protege 5's some years back - They required a larger center bore because the Protege is FWD and the RX-7 was RWD. I think the machining cost me about $25 per wheel, or $100 for each set
 
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