I need some help with wheels. I have done a lot of reading here as well as searching and it only confused me more. I have an 08 Regular Cab 2WD STX - Dark Blue Pearl

My last two vehicles were front wheel drive cars and I never had a problem picking out wheels. This truck is different. I have 255/65/17 stock wheels and tires and I want to upgrade to a 20x8.5 or 20x9" wheel. I want street tires but I want to fill the wheel wells a little better than stock. I do intend on getting rear drop shackles to level it but I want till fill out the wells a little more than just shackles. I do not want to lower the truck, just the rear shackles. You guys talk about backspacing a lot but none of the sites I visit for tires even tell what it means. I don't even know if this really needs to be considered for my application. I want my truck leveled on some 20's with street sticky tread. Any suggestions on sizes for wheels or tires?

 

I think I have decided on these wheels.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/20-HA...spagenameZWDVW

 

Personally, I'd suggest some 305/40-22's with a 22x9.5 inch wide wheel. Mine have 6.7 inches of backspacing and I think that is just about perfect.
You are right, you need to consider backspacing on any wheel application because you don't want to wind up with the the tires/wheels sticking way outside the wheelwells and looking bad . It's simply a measurement. It's the distance from the mounting surface of the wheel (where it bolts to the hub) to it's rear edge. They oem 17's are 7.5 inches wide with 5.5 inches of backspacing.
If you do go with a 20, I'd suggest a 20x9 inch wheel and a 305/50-20 or a 295/50-20 tire.

 

Thanks for the reply. So the Harley replica wheels and som 305/50x20's will do the job? Most sites do not list the backspace. How do I find out what it is?

 

Someone posted a conversion table a while back.