Do your wheels contact each other when stacking?

I have 18 x 9.5" rims and vary between using 265 and 275 track tires of various manufacturers. Most people would say that the 275 is too wide for this size of rim but when I use 265/35-18 RS4s, when I stack the wheels, the rims hit each other i.e the section width is less than the outer edge of the rim. Should I expect this to happen with the  more ideal sized tire? I don't think the rim lip is overly wide. I am now using 275 Nanking CRS tires on the same rims and they don't seem to be overly pinched and the rims don't touch when stacked. I know the ideal would be to buy wider rims but budget and fitment issues (this is on a FK8 Civic Type R) prevent this.

If you're stretching the tire for more sidewall support, it can happen. My track tires are like that, the wheels make contact when stacking. My street tires don't, because I run a narrower wheel (relative to the tire width) to get a little more compliance. 

Some yes, some no.  I had pizza cutters on my F250 (215/80-16) and the rims definitely were the widest part.  My van wheel/tire combo would be pretty close to equal.  The old Lincoln wheels have balloons on them and I could probably store an L.A. phone book between the wheel lips.

Mine don't even a 275/60-15 on a 10" rim. I'm pretty sure if I stretched that tire out in a 14" dbl headlock wheel they would.

It's pretty common and you might be surprised at how little stretch it takes for the rim to be the widest part of the whole assembly. It's not a problem, other than for protecting the paint on the wheels when stacked...

Track tires and wheels?  Yup.

Street tires and wheels?  Naw.

I am not really worried about street tires but for my track wheels and tires, I was wondering if the best sized tires with the best wheel support would lead to the rims hitting each other when stacked. I may have just been using too big tires for my wheels for a long time.

In reply to SlowHonda :

I mean, is this really a problem? I have cardboard I put between my track wheels when stacking or laying on the ground. I don't really pick my track wheel and tire setup with how well they stack in mind ;) 

I wish. The biggest wheels I've found are pretty skinny and I stuff too much tire.

On my street cars... well I drive jeeps so no worries there.

My thought was if the wheels touched, I wasn't maximizing my tire size. The Grassroots article from November with the 245 vs the 235 on the Nd Miata found the larger tire was faster although the wheel size they used seemed more than adequate. 

The rule of thumb I have used is the following...

205 on 8s.

225 on 9s

245 on 10s

I ran the 245 40 15 on my 2nd gen rx7 on 10 inch wide wheels and loved it.  I had previously tried to run 225s and 245s on 8s and they just felt soft and floppy.  The 10s really sharpened the car up AND I got more uniform tire wear.

In reply to SlowHonda :

Mmm - I would phrase what you're looking a bit differently than.

So from the perspective of the NA/NB Miata world: I run 245s, they fit on a 9" wheel but in testing it's usually found the 245 on a 9 is slower than a 225 on a 9 even though the 225 is a "smaller" tire, the bit of stretch makes the difference. I instead run my 245s on a 10 which gives some stretch and folks have found that is usually faster than a 245on9 or 225on9 (we're generalizing a lot here, so grain of salt).

I.e. if my only metric was if it maximizes rubber for a given wheel width for my chassis and tire compounds - I would have the slower setup. Is that always true? I'm not sure, we'll have to have more concrete examples for your wheels/tire/chassis. 

wvumtnbkr said:

The rule of thumb I have used is the following...

205 on 8s.

225 on 9s

245 on 10s

 

I ran the 245 40 15 on my 2nd gen rx7 on 10 inch wide wheels and loved it.  I had previously tried to run 225s and 245s on 8s and they just felt soft and floppy.  The 10s really sharpened the car up AND I got more uniform tire wear.

I usually generalize that as matching the carcass width to the wheel width. I'll go 1" narrower for a street fitment. 

Happens all the time to me, but varies according to fitment and tire model.

Some tires have especially generous rim protector beads (thanks, Hoosier!).  Some have zero (Looking at you, Nankang).

And then there's the fitment.  As a staunch supporter of slightly stretched fit,  and sometimes a bit more than that, I very often have wheel stick-out.

My solution is to stack them on cardboard shims.  I have a bunch of round ones that came with some overseas tire shipments, but have also used the box inserts from wheel shipments (Thanks, Flyin' Miata!).

Thanks for all your answers. Agree with Andy that if I had Hoosiers this wouldn't be an issue. I have used square foam flooring pads (Walmart for under $20) to separate the wheels that do touch. The Type R has issues with fitting larger width wheels due to the high OEM offset so I will likely just end up with 265s in the future on my 9.5" rims. Nanking does make a 255/35-18 but it seems really short. BTW, this is for Time-Attack competition, not just lapping. 

The most annoying thing about stacking on wheels rather than on rubber is that they are a lot less stable when stacked, especially if you're trying to move them around on a dolley.