Noob ?s 4U

[YotaFanBoy]

I swear I searched and scanned for some clues on these two questions but I am such a noob that I might not even recognize the answer if I saw it unless it was directed at me. So if I may pick your experience, I have some dumb questions:

1. Thinking about getting rid of my stock 07 SE alloy rims and getting something cooler after seeing some of the pics on this forum. The stock rims immediately turn me off when I look at my car now that I have seen some of the kickass setups on this site. My question is if I go to 18" TRD (or anything else) rims would I NEED to do a drop for the rims to look right? I can't really drop at all at this time until I get my driveway fixed and I don't want to look totally clueless by getting rims that don't fit the setup of the car.

2. My window sticker says I have the "Sport Springs & Bushings". I am assuming they are not the TRD springs. Is that a correct assumption? Is there any good way of determining for sure?

Thanks for any help.

[Punks_Not_Dead5]

1. You don't NEED to drop it at all, 18's will look fine. even 19's...if you do drop it, i'd go 18's for a better ride.

2. You're correct you do not have TRD Springs. TRD and Eibach springs are essentially the same, just rebaged. So if you decided to get lowering springs go with those two above mentioned, or Tien.

[rydr1]

and let me be the first inline if you wan to sell the SE springs and alloys.

[ScrooYoo]

No you don't need to drop it at all. Just bolt on your rims and if you hate the way it sits then you can go ahead and lower it. I wouldn't bother wasting money on lowering the car unless you really want a stiffer/harsher ride or you hate the way it sits. Plus you can totally destroy your car if you bottom out too hard and in the wrong place.

One word of advice tho, make sure you use a tire calculator to get the right size wheel/tire combo for your car or you risk brake failure.

[Punks_Not_Dead5]

the car isn't low enough to cause a lot of damage unless you're a wreckless driver and speed over speedbumps and such. i've taken my car off road down bad back roads and never scraped once, i was careful took my time and picked my routes. I have hit my exhaust twice though, one was my own fault for hitting the gas to hard out of a parkling lot...if you just take caution and care you're fine once it's lowered..2"s isn't that much at all..

The ride is stiffer, but seeing you have an SE it won't be as bad as if you went from and LE/XLE to TRD/Eibach springs.

[ScrooYoo]

Originally Posted by Punks_Not_Dead5

the car isn't low enough to cause a lot of damage unless you're a wreckless driver and speed over speedbumps and such. i've taken my car off road down bad back roads and never scraped once, i was careful took my time and picked my routes. I have hit my exhaust twice though, one was my own fault for hitting the gas to hard out of a parkling lot...if you just take caution and care you're fine once it's lowered..2"s isn't that much at all..

The ride is stiffer, but seeing you have an SE it won't be as bad as if you went from and LE/XLE to TRD/Eibach springs.

Well if you drive alone there isn't that much danger, but its a diff story if you have two or three of your friends in the back seat.(especially if they're big dudes) My gen 5 isn't lowered and I've scraped pretty hard a few times with a full car and I'm an extremely gentle driver.

[geoff5093]

Originally Posted by Punks_Not_Dead5

1. You don't NEED to drop it at all, 18's will look fine. even 19's...if you do drop it, i'd go 18's for a better ride.

You dont need to, but if you are going with 2xx/40/18 tires then theres going to be a huge gap, I never even thought about lowing my car but when I got rims I decided that it would look a lot better lowered.

This is what it looked like before I had it lowered: