I put some 19's on my car yesterday (which fit, but barely) and notice that there is a decent amount of fender-tire gap. my question is that if i lowered it, would that bring the wheel closer to the control arm or would the control arm sit in the same relationship to the tire as before?
thanks.

 

I am pretty sure lowing the car would reduce the gap between the fender and the tire.

 

Lowering wouldn't do much in terms of control arm clearance; if you're fine now, chances are you'll be fine after you're lowered. What width wheels are you running, and what offset do they have?

 

19x8.5 ET35, 235/35/19 yokohama avs sports, lookin at getting sport springs

 

Those tires are a little wide for the B5 (one wider than stock), but the wheels are perfectly fine.

 

yeah they are wide but i like em

 

Lowering your car will create more negative camber, so the top of the tires will be closer to the control. It could be 5-7mm closer depends on how much you lower it. But for the spec of your wheel+tire combination, the main problem will be rubbing the front fenders. You may need to get them rolled. Your size is the same as the overall size of my 235/45/17, and I had some serious rubbing issus at my ride height. I rolled my fenders using some long bars, and you can use heat gun to heat the paint up to avoid paint crack. Now I can even use some 245/45/17 tires.

 

Don't get overconfident with the 245's, that's what I'm running, on 18s and it's a little much, I can't lower my car as much as I would have liked. I'm using KWs and I had to adjust like mad before getting it as low as possible without rubbing, and forget the front, they'll rub in back too if you want to get that wheel gap totally gone. It's not just the fender lip that will rub in the front, it'll be the plastic. And in the back there is no fender lip, it'll be right up in the quarter panel. I'm sitting with one inch of gap right now and 1 mm lower would be a hassle, it took a few hours before i got it perfect. If you're using KWs I can measure exactly what height I'm at for you.

 

I can run 245 without any problem, but I had to roll my fenders. It's just a DIY job which took me less than an hour. And of course, I cut the lowest part of the plastic wheel liner as well. Now I can run 245/45/17 tires on 17x8 wheels without any problem, and the tires fit low inside the fenders. But it would rub if I use 17x8.5 wheels. Also, your wheel offset could be part of your problem. You shouldn't have more than 5mm gap between the top of your tires and the upper control arms. Also, I only use 245 on my race wheels for autox and track days. You shouldn't need such wide tires on street.

 

Seriously, It's wider than you need for street. Yeah, I have 8.5'' wide rims. But if you look in this picture you'll see, it's still lowered nicely, but 1 mm more and it rubbed too often. Now it rubs if I hit a serious dip from a manhole.