Fitting Weld Racing Pro Stars on a 1995 Mustang GT

I have a lot of people ask about my wheel/tire combination, so I hope this page will answer a lot of the questions I am frequently asked.  I am quite happy with the look my car has and its stance.  



NOTES
One thing to note is that my car is lowered about 1.5" in the  front and 1.25" or so inches in the back due to my H&R Racing springs.  Any clearances I have may be different depending on the ride height of your car.

WHEEL STUDS (top)
You pretty much have to have the 3" extended lugs to run any weld wheel.  It is a LOT thicker than the stock type wheels.  You can get away with it, but it didn't look very safe to me.  I didn't like it. My extended lugs came with my Moser axles.

The fronts take a bit more work.  The lugs are in the hub, not the rotor, so there is more work involved to get them out.  They hammer right out, but the new ones need to be pressed in.  I used some old lugnuts and an impact wrench and a bunch of washers to get mine in.  Unfortunately I was unable to find the proper knurl size, so I went up one size.  I didn't want to pay $30 for the right drill bit and I needed to get them in to go to a race, so I attempted it with a dremel.  It took a LONG time.  It would be best to get the right size knurl.

TIRES (top)

The rear street tires are 295/50-15 BFGoodrich Radial T/As.  I got them on closeout from Sears really cheap. They are fine as a street tire, but have zero street traction in my car.  That's okay - I like them for the look.  At the track they do okay though - I've cut low 1.9 sixty foot times with them which is pretty decent for a non-drag-radial street tire.  These tires are about 26.6" tall, which is almost an inch taller than the 25.7" tall stock tires.  I won't go into how much wider they are! :-)

The rear track tires are 8.5x26-15 Mickey Thompson ET Drag "true" slicks.  I've had them for 4 seasons and counting and they still work great.  For looks, I wish I had gone for a 10x26 tire since the 8.5s look so small, but they seem to work quite well.  To date, I've run a large number of very low 1.6 sixty foots on them with a 5 speed and an automatic.  That's with a basically totally stock suspension and no chassis stiffening too.  On a well prepared car, they should easily get into the low 1.5s.

The front tires are generic 165-R15 skinnies that I got for around $90/pair from BB&T Racing in Southaven, MS.  They seem to be a decent tire.  My only complaint is that I wish it was just a little taller and also that it didn't bulge quite so bad - even when inflated to the recommended maximum.  I guess that is part of putting such a skinny tire on a front heavy car.

WHEELS (top)


All the wheels are Weld Racing Pro Stars. The Mustang bolt pattern for 5 lugs is 5x4.5.
Note, these are NOT the Pro Star XPs that are made to fit easier over larger brakes.

FITMENT (top)
Everything cleared well in the back, but I did do some slight, easy modifications.  The brake rotors and calipers clear fine.  You have to bend the emergency brake cable down about 90* or so.  A BFH (Big F-ing Hammer) did it quick and easy.


I also flipped the quad shocks over - they are 50/50 so it doesn't matter, but it does give much more tire clearance.  I had to cut the boot off the driver's side quad because the rear is apparently a little off center.  No big deal there either.


Last, I hammered the lip in the rear of the fender up a little bit.  It didn't hit normally, but with a heavy load in the trunk or back seat, it got close.  I figured, I may as well get more clearance, but again, a couple swings with a BFH is all you need. That edge is sharp and the last place I want to have close tire clearance is on a sharp edge. Exhaust pipes are still stock and cleared fine.  It's close, but they don't rub. That will also depend on the quality of your H pipe - I have a cheap one that fits terrible.


No rolling the fender lip, no hammering the inner fender, no removing the quads. Not bad - hardly any work for some big meats in the back.  The rear tires just come to the edge of the fender, but they are inside the top edge of the fender. Fits absolutely perfect, I think.


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Now for the fronts.  You HAVE to do some grinding.  I ran with a 7/16" spacer (still have them in the attic if anyone wants them, let me know) and ground the bar down the side of the caliper down about halfway (maybe 1/8" - 1/4"?).  That worked, but there wasn't much lug in the lugnut (even with the extended studs) and was borderline non-NHRA legal (may not have been).  It also made the fronts stick out more than I liked.  Looked fine, but not as good as it could be.

* Pics to come later *

To get rid of the spacer, that bar needs to be completely cut off.  You also have to grind the outer face of the caliper down - mostly in the center of the outside face above the u-shaped notch in the middle.  I used some chalk and rubbed the side of the caliper, then installed the wheel and spun it by hand.  It would rub the chalk off where it hit.  Pull the wheel and grind some more.  I repeated this process many times.  It was tedious, but I didn't want to take any more material off than I had to, so I did it a little bit at a time.

It took me about a hour or more on the first wheel.  Then I knew how much to take off and the 2nd wheel was about 10-15 minutes.  I have a big 9" and smaller 3.5" angle grinder that took the metal off fast.  This would be a
lot more tedious with a dremel. 

I haven't noticed any ill effects from modifying the front brakes, but I also don't drive a whole lot.  15 miles round trip about 3 times a week is pretty much all the street time I see with it anymore.  The look and the weight savings was certainly worth it.  I love the way it looks! 

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Here are a bunch of other pictures (including hi-res versions of the pics on this page)
http://schwarzmann.com/pictures/mustang95/projects/wheelsandtires/