i have heard different stories in regards to whether or not i can put 15in rims with 1in snow tires on my mazda 6....it curently has 17in....i have the v6 sport edition....can i do this....

 

usually it's one size down (to 16 in.) and the closest to the diameter (up/down)
in our case for the 215 50 17 it's diameter is 25.5
let's say for a 205 50 17 it's diameter is 25.1
for a 225 45 17 it's 25.0 and so on

in your case for 16 inches , like I was offered originally at the Mazda dealer , they came up with 205 60 16 .... but I never verified it's diameter since I was buying chrome wheels for the summer and staying with 17 's .

You can find these specs and more on tire web sites and your tire dealer can help you find the closest diameter . Good hunting .

Ron

 

FYI....17" Snow tires work fine. You don't necessarily need to go down in rim size.

I'm running 205/50R17 Dunlop WinterSport M3's. You could also run the 215/50R17 (Stock Mazda6 size). I'm running the 205's so that I can swap the tires between my 6 and my 3 if I need to.

If you want to calculate the difference in tire sizes. Go to www.tirerack.com and click on their Tire Calculator.

Stock size for the 17" Mazda6 is 215/50R17.

 

Okay, guys...support your own!!



http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

Any calculation you want to do, and it'll tell you how far off you'll be.

As far as simply tire sizes, the 205/65/15 would be the closest, however hard to find, and we haven't even gotten into the brake clearance issues yet. I went to Tirerack.com, and they have 7 tires in that size which are winter tires. My choice would be the Michelin Alpin tires.

It seems as if the '05s only come with either 16 or 17 inch wheels, while the '04s come with a 15 inch snow option.