Fitting Nissan Elgrand E51 wheels

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Laz
Junior Bongonaut
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Jun 20, 2024 8:51 pm

Fitting Nissan Elgrand E51 wheels

Post by Laz » Sun Sep 15, 2024 9:28 pm

So I took a chance on some very cheap 17" Elgrand wheels on eBay.
The stud centres are the same, 5x114mm.
They're only half an inch wider, 6.5" vs 6". The offset/ET is 45mm vs 40mm for the Bongo wheels so all the extra width is on the inside. There was nothing close enough to the standard wheels for this to be an issue. It does change the scrub radius but only makes it slightly more negative, far better than making it positive which can happen with wheels which stick out a lot more than standard. Ideally I would've fitted spacers to keep it absolutely standard but the studs aren't long enough and the change really is the best part of naff all anyway.

The Elgrand wheel nuts are a different thread pitch so can't be used, fortunately the Bongo ones have the same taper.

The big problem with Elgrand wheels is that the centre bore is smaller by 1mm so they just won't go on the hubs. In a perfect world they'd be machined out but instead I spent what felt like an eternity with an 80grit flap wheel in a drill to remove the offending material. Although it would be very hard to make them fit if you did manage to make the hole eccentric I covered myself by making it another mm bigger. The only purpose of a snug fitting centre bore is to align the wheel while you start the studs/nuts so it doesn't matter that it's now a bit loose.

The centre caps had a separate Nissan badge which I drilled off, filled the holes with epoxy and stuck on some Mazda badges from eBay. The badges are domed and the caps are almost flat so i put a dob of epoxy in the centre of the badges to keep them on.

I'm pretty pleased with results.
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1995 2wd diesel auto Montague with rear conversion and AFT.
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