BruceC

I could "wheelie" use some help here. The car is a 1978 Delta 88 Royale, 4.3L, 260 cid V8. All stock as far as I know. The problem is that over the course of the past year, both front wheels have broken off of the car. The breaks occurred in the lug area with the center of the wheels staying on the car and the rest of the wheel breaking off. The car was moving when this happened in both cases, but very slowly in a parking lot.
I am trying to find some used 15 inch steel wheels for the car but they seem to have all but disappeared. One used wheel dealer has some but he needs to make sure that he is selling me the correct 15 inch wheels in order to clear the front disc brakes. All I know is that they are 15 X 6 with P225/75R15 tires on them. Any info on the dimensions of the wheels would be greatly appreciated. I have no idea what the offset, etc. is and cannot find reliable info on this.
Thanks very much.
Bruce

joe_padavano

Offset will be zero. All 1977-1984 D88s came with disc brakes, so all factory wheels will clear. I'm guessing that your 260-powered car does not have the larger 12" rotors (and 5x5" bolt pattern), so you need wheels with the 5x4.75" bolt pattern. Used on all 1977-1984 B-body cars with standard brakes and all 1977-1990 Caprice with standard brakes. Note that police/taxi cars got the large brakes and large bolt pattern. These wheels should pretty much grow on trees.

Olds64

That is weird that the center of the wheel broke away from the hub. I would never forsee this happening on a stock wheel. They were pretty much bullet proof (just a big piece of stamped steel).

BruceC

Thanks everyone for the info. Strange as it is to believe, these wheels are just about non-existent in my neck of the woods. The wheel breakage happened not once but twice. The first time was about a year ago when the driver side front wheel broke right off of the car as I was turning into a driveway. This time it happened a week ago, passenger side front. Same type of break, right around the hub. The wheels "bageled"

I told the guy who thought he might of had the wheels for me the story about this car since I bought it. On the day that I was driving it home on an expressway, the transmission blew. I didn't even have the car for one hour yet. Had the tranny rebuilt, one month later the engine spun a bearing. Both wheels breaking off. He told me the car might be trying to tell me something. Who knows? It is just a nice hunk of Detroit iron and I am torn about selling it.

Thanks again!
Bruce

Olds64

When I bought my 64 Olds 98 it had a tire blow out during the test drive. I still bought it and enjoyed it for a number of years. Most Oldsmobile owners are in a love hate relationship.