beaten to death: 215/40/16 or 205/55/16

Your car will handle much better w/ 215/45, but your ride will suffer, and your speedo won't be as accurate. I doubt you'll have any rubbing issues w/ that size. Hope I could help

El Camino... hmmm good question:lol: :lol:

oops i missed that you're looking for 215/40. I don't know about others, but I personally do not recommend this. For autoX only? Sure, why not. But for the street, I think cons outweigh the pros. Its all up to you. Better handling or baad ride quality (assuming) and incorrect speedo.

Possible consider going to a 205-50-16 tire instead, 40 series will look incredible bad on the stock 16" rims.

yeah 205/50 should do very well, since Japanese GC8 WRX and STi comes with that profile standard. Good luck!

The 215/40/16 will be about 2 inches smaller in diameter than the 205/55/16. That will throw you speedometer way off.

215/50/16 will be about 1/2 an inch smaller, and 215/55/16 will be about 1/2 an inch larger. So these sizes would be a better choice, both for speedometer reading, and ride comfort.

As far as tire sizes go, here's a nice chart on the Bridgestone Potenza S-03 that shows all the data. You can check their other tires there as well.

http://www.bridgestonetire.com/products/s03pptec.htm

Examples (as close as I could find for our comparison)

215/40ZR17 - 23.8" diameter
215/45ZR17 - 24.6" diameter
215/55ZR16 - 25.3" diameter

Here's a general tire diameter calculator. There will be slight variations between different tires, but this calculator is pretty accurate.

For example, with the S0-3 sizes given, here's the results the calculator came up with.

215/40ZR17 - 23.77" diameter
215/45ZR17 - 24.61" diameter
215/55ZR16 - 25.31" diameter

Stock diameter is 24.88"

Oops, forgot the link:
http://www.rx7turboturbo.com/robrobinette/tire_diameter.htm

I'm running sumitomo HTRZ-II's in 205/45-16. Ive had the kumhos in the same size before. i like them better than 205/50 and 205/55 series but the only thing is the speedo and odo readings. I'm used to it so it doesn't matter to me. they do feel stiffer than 55 profiles.