OEM wheel weights?

Shame on me, but I haven't done a search. The info wasn't in the OEM wheel & tire sizes thread because it got locked, BUT, what are the weights for the different OEM wheels: steel, aluminum.

I've got the base i model 15" steel wheels & caps, and i'm desperate to upgrade them to something much lighter to improve handling. would anyone know this information?

if you have 15" wheels you aren't going to find anything "much lighter" i have no idea how heavy they are as i don't know of anyone with that particular wheel... just take one off and go weigh it on a scale if you are desperate..

www.tirerack.com has all the tire weights of the brands they carry so subtract that from your weight and you got the rim weight...

if you want your 3 to handle better yes wheels will help but i would at least +1 if not +2 to a 16" or 17" inch wheel to reduce side wall and give you less flex (to a point) also new grippier tires as you have 15" they are probably shod with some really hard all season that will last 60k+ look into a new set of springs and some new suspension components such as racing beats front and rear bars or progress' rear bar. any combination of lowering, wider and softer tires and swaybar upgrades will help.

brandanasan said:

Shame on me, but I haven't done a search. The info wasn't in the OEM wheel & tire sizes thread because it got locked, BUT, what are the weights for the different OEM wheels: steel, aluminum.

I've got the base i model 15" steel wheels & caps, and i'm desperate to upgrade them to something much lighter to improve handling. would anyone know this information?

Click to expand...

One thing you might look at doing if you are serious about upgrading rims to something lighter for handling is also bigger brakes. The 'S' model mazda3 has bigger brakes than the I model.

You could get some nice 17" wheels that weigh in the same or less than the steelies and then grab some rotors and calipers from a junked 3. I'm not sure what else is different between the two setups, but I would imagine the master cylinder is different too.

But if you wanted to stick with 15" rims you could get some very lightweight ones, just look around