It’s a trend that’s been pretty big in Japan lately. What am I talking about? Well, take a look at the car below and tell me if you see anything trippy. You’re looking at a 19″/20″ combo by the way.
You’re raising the wheel arch higher as to allow the suspension components to have full travel and ride as low as possible while not compromising your offset. In other words, you’ll be slammed, rolling, but still flush, not tucked. Basically, cutting the fender opening, usually enlarging the diameter in order to accommodate and “frame” larger wheels.
So, instead of going with the flow and accepting the height that the car sits at with fender kissing rim, you’ll want to raise the fender line so the car can sit flat on the ground while sitting flush with regular 19/20″ wheels. Now, this is indeed a brilliant idea but there is one downside.
This is something you DON’T want to do unless you are committed to drive slammed all the time because you will have more fender gap then you normally would. Even if you are actually lower then the car next to you, you will not appear to be if you look at the gap. Also, this is something that should not be left for a normal body shop. In some situations, the car could be touching the ground and will still have fender gap which defeats the purpose of doing it in the first place. Precise measuring is needed.
It’s still relatively new to United States but it will become more and more normal as people constantly push the fitment scene. Whether it be VIP or not. As far as I know, there are probably about a handful of people in US that have done this and all their cars look absolutely stunning. Big props to Japan for thinking outside the box and giving us inspiration and motivation to keep the VIP game alive in this great country of ours and all around the world.
Credits: BLKonBLK98, widebody_Q & elpresidente from VIPStyleCars.