For over 10 years, the Flow Formed Apex EC-7 has been one of the most popular wheels in grassroots racing and track day enthusiasts. It has a classic motorsport 7-spoke “Y” pattern which is one of the lightest, stiffest, and strongest geometries for an aluminum wheel. There’s a reason most wheels in professional motorsports use this spoke design.
Apex’s Flow Formed technology enables them to make high performing wheels at a lower price than forged wheels. In fact, their flow formed wheels have a higher load rating than some competitor’s forged wheels! All of their wheels are VIA/JWL Certified.
What is truly incredible is Apex’s Warranty and unmatched Wheel Replacement Program. Apex offers their customers a 50% discount to replace their damaged wheels, whether the damage was from a pot hole or curb on the street, or from racing incidents or crashes on track. I am not aware of any other wheel manufacturer that takes care of the track day and amateur racing community to this degree by making the sport a little more affordable for consumable items like wheels.
The barrel looks really wide because we chose a 18×11” wheel for our project car. If you haven’t read my article on How to PROPERLY select and size TIRES for PERFORMANCE, be sure to check it out! In that article you’ll find out that the first step when choosing a wheel and tire combination for a car is actually to first select the tire and size that best fits your needs. From there, you should select the optimal wheel width for that tire. Using this approach, we chose a 305/35-18 Nitto NT01, which is ideally paired with this 18×11” Apex EC-7 wheel.
As much mass was removed from the center hub as possible to reduce unsprung weight. The inner spokes and large inner diameter of the barrel make clearance for massive big brake kits.
Our final spec was a set of square (all four wheels and tires are the same size and offset) 18×11 +52 Apex EC-7 in Matte Bronze. This is an off-the-shelf size for the S197 Mustang with the 5×114.3 bolt pattern that is commonly used on track and autocross cars. In fact, this was the exact setup the NASA American Iron and TT2 winners used this year.
Apex offers wheels for SN95, S197, and S550 Mustangs in 18” and 19” diameters and 9-11.5” widths. While I personally like the looks of 19” wheels on these cars, the purpose of this project is budget and track-focused, while still being livable on the street.
With that being the driving factor, we chose an 18×11” wheel so we can run on all four corners and be able to rotate the tires to prolong their life on the track. We also chose to go with 18s because they are less expensive than 19” tires and there are far more tire options (including race car take-off slicks) for 18” wheels.
Following the advice from my article on Selecting Tires, and trying to run the widest wheel and tire possible, our constraints led us to a 305/35-18 NT01 and the 18×11 Apex EC-7.
Quick Reference:
Page 1 – Intro & Palm Beach Motorsports
Page 2 – Apex EC-7 Tech
Page 3 – EC-7 Weight & Nitto NT01 Tech
Page 4 – NT01 Weight & Mounting
Page 5 – Mounted NT01 and EC-7 Weight and Comparison
Page 6 – Wheel Weight Comparison and Install
Page 7 – Wheel Spacer Tech and Clearances
Page 8 – Rear Wheel Clearance
Page 9 – Installed Pics
12 comments
Hey Billy, great update. Those wheels look great in bronze against your silver car.
I noticed you saved 5lbs per front tire. Did you get a weight on the old rear setup?
Looks like 275/40-19 PS4S are 31lbs new (per Tire Rack) vs 28lbs for the 255s.
The internets say the 19×9.5 PP rear wheels are ~34lbs, so I’d expect about 10lbs saved per rear. Huge!
Unfortunately I lost the pic of the weight of the original rear wheels. I want to say they were a couple pounds heavier than the fronts.
Thanks for the great article again, Billy. I really, really enjoy this series and I can’t wait for the next one! I would love to buy one of these Mustangs and replicate your build, but the market is too crazy for me right now.
What do the 305s up front do to steering response? Does it tramline like crazy? Does the steering get vague? I’d also love to know the front/rear/cross weight balance as well. Sorry for all the questions.
Steering response is pretty similar to stock, but increasing the front width of any tire will increase tramlining. The nose weight should be around 54-55% at the moment. I have not weighed it yet but that will be discussed during the battery relocation kit article.
Hey Billy love this articles. I just received my set of Apex SM-10 19×11 ET26 Front ET52 rears for my 2017 GT track day car. And I can’t wait to put tires on in Europe getting good 305/30 tires is hard so I might get 295/30 instead I hope it will be a step up from my current 275/35/19 on PP1 wheels. Thank you for the lovely read.
I’m glad to hear it. Thank you for the feedback!
Great series Billy! What modifications have you done to address the MT82 Shifting issues? I’ve heard of a ton of solutions from trans mount inserts to Tremec swaps.
Thank you! Stay tuned for the next installement!
This is an extremely informative and well written series. I’m glad to have found your site.
Thank you. I’m glad you’re enjoying the content.
I instruct for NASA & JUST TRACK IT -ATLANTA, Ga. 20-24wkends/year in 2016 Mustang with full STEEDA SUSPENSION & 2-PC ROTOR/BRAKE LINE UPGRD.. I have APEX SM-10 & APEX EC-7-18 /11 & 19/11 WITH TOYO R888R & RR . I . HAVE USED NTO1 IN PRIOR Seasons.. Have U tried TOYO VS. NITTO..( Toyo -OWNER OF both BRANDS)?? FRT NEG CAMBER DO U USE ??? 🏁APPRECIATE UR INFO🏁