Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Hi.
I'm looking to fit 26R wheels to my S4

Anything I should be aware of other than I need to change the spline hubs for the 4 stud affairs?

Are copy wheels available and are the 4 stud hubs available too?

Also are the hubs as easy to swap as would appear??

Many Thanks

Hi,
I think TTR sell wheels for standard hub - might be wrong on that.
The 26R rear hub assembly is completely different to an S4

Regards
Steve

You can fit 26R wheels to an S4 in several ways:
1. Buy wheels with the same peg drive system as the S4 - Both TTR and Kelvedon lotus sell them in aluminium or magnesium. Downside is that spinners are not like the 26R ones and the standard peg drive is way inferior to the 26R ones.

2. Buy 26R front and rear hubs (S1 type at the rear), spinners, drive pegs, and wheels (mag or ally). All is a straight swap. Most authentic looking in my opinion, but most racers find it necessary to put some locking mechanism on the spinners.

3. Buy bolt on hubs front and rear and then the bolt on version of 26R wheels, in mag or ally. Most secure way of attaching the wheels, but not as attractive in some people's view.

Whatever you do, there are choices you can make as to 5 1/2" or 6" rims. You can also expect clearance problems on the rear wishbones and maybe interference on the wheel arches. (I assume that you have the smaller id springs already at the rear). All is sortable but not necessarily as straightforward as you might hope. I suggest you call Tony Thompson at TTR or Pat Thomas at Kelvedon for advice

Most informative, many thanks for the advice.

I shall call TTR and go from there.

Lee

I looked at options 1 and 2 a year ago, went down the option 1 route as really found it hard to justify the massive cost differential and pretty happy with the result. I have 26r alloy spinners with correct thread and bevel.

So the option 2 part being the hubs with the 4 pins?

When you refer to "hub" do you been just the disk which holds the pins and centre lock thread?

Looking at these it looks a fairly straight forward job or an I missing something?

I bought the kelvedon 5 peg 6 x 13 alloy 26r wheels and these attach straight to standard knock on hubs. I bought alloy 26r spinners to suit. Very happy
Option 2 using the 4 peg drive seemed a realllly costly although perhaps a more correct way if doing it but I couldn't justify the cost

Ah I see... I misread your post.

Yes option 1 seems perfectly acceptable to me too.

So your spinners are now on keeping with 26R?

gordont wrote:I bought the kelvedon 5 peg 6 x 13 alloy 26r wheels and these attach straight to standard knock on hubs. I bought alloy 26r spinners to suit. Very happy
Option 2 using the 4 peg drive seemed a realllly costly although perhaps a more correct way if doing it but I couldn't justify the cost

Hello Gordont, except from the look, are these alloy wheels lighter than the original steel ones?

Chaps... Those that have fitted the 26R wheels... What size tyres have you gone for?

I'm looking for a track type tyre

I use 6" rims on my 26R bodied car with the Dunlop racing tyres. More relevantly, I used 5 1/2 on my road sports car (narrow bodied) with either 175/60x13 or 185/60x13 Yoko A048 tyres. It is tricky to get 185 tyre under a standard wheel arch (need to get the wheel offset just right and it's different for every car). In my opinion 175/60 tyres work best anyway.
There's more risk of the rim fouling the rear wishbones with 6" wheels but the trade off is that they probably give the best performance.

Good luck and expect to have to do some machining somewhere in the process!

Paul

I use A048 175 at front and 185 at rear, car has 26R guards

Thanks chaps.... Most useful.

Btw what are "26R guards"

26r guards are what was fitted to 26r, basically adds about 1 1/2 inch per side (someone is bound to correct my guess at the width...)

Very nice....