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I've gone to 3 different places and they all will NOT fit anything bigger than 165/75 13s on my Polo MK1..

I was told by lots of people that 175/50 13s would fit..

also.. 165/75s would be fine.. and a place near me has offered me a full set of 4x 165/75 13s GoodYear tyres + fitting is £156.00

what you reckon?

What wheels are you using, standard 4.5J steels?

145R13 5"

although new tyres will be going on 5.5" alloys.

OK, here's the boring technical stuff...

175/50 x 13's will safely fit a rim between 5 and 6.5J, however due to the lower rolling radius of the tyre, your speedo will not register your true speed. Compared to the standard 145/80 x 13's fitted to a Mk1, if you fit 175/50 x 13's your speedo will register 70mph when you are actually travelling at 62.9mph

165/75 x 13's will safely fit a rim between 4.5 and 6J, however in this case the rolling radius of the new (165/75) tyre is slightly higher, meaning your speedo will register 70mph when you are actually travelling at 71.93mph

You also need to consider any potential safety issues; a rim that is too narrow in relation to the tyre width will allow the tyre to distort excessively sideways under fast (!) cornering.

On the other hand, unduly wide rims on an ordinary car tend to give rather a harsh ride because the sidewalls have not got enough curvature to make them flex over bumps and potholes. I don't know if 175's scrub on a Mk1, but I'm sure someone on here will know!

Finally, steering weight...the wider the tyre, the heavier the steering when parking!

I don't know if any of this is of help to you...but it's certainly food for thought!

NornIron wrote: On the other hand, unduly wide rims on an ordinary car tend to give rather a harsh ride because the sidewalls have not got enough curvature to make them flex over bumps and potholes. I don't know if 175's scrub on a Mk1, but I'm sure someone on here will know!

I ran 175/50s on a 5.5" rim and lowered 40mm for about 7k miles and never had a single rubbing incident, even on cattle grid jumps!

I have 165/65/13's on my mk1 golf gti alloys pitted to the polo with 40mm lowering and ive had no adverse effects, rubbing etc.

I have to be aware tho that my speedo isnt exactly right lol

sorry but i couldn't be bothered to use any calculator thingamy jigs to see why they're saying they can't do it.....but my tyres are 185/60/13 on my mk2 hatch with no scrubbage....as i said i havn't checked any calculators but that 165/75 tyre doesn't sound right, my original tyres were 145/80 so you're going 2 stages wider and only 1 smaller profile, but as i said that's compared to my tyres so prob best to check it in comparison to you're orignal wheels