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The Torq Thrust II's I have are 15X6. There are lots of 4.5X5 bolt pattern wheels out there, since it was a very popular size for FoMoCo and Mopar cars through the 60's and early 70's, and still continues on some cars.
However, from my (rather light) research, it seems like most 15X6 wheels have 3 3/4" back spacing, which is probably good for the Mustangs and Cargers they usually go onto. But that's a little too much for a PV's front suspension. For whatever reason, the Torq Thrust II in particular (and not the other American Racing Torq Thrust models) is made with a 3 3/8" backspacing, which fits.
The clearance issues are:
1) The outer tie rods up front - which sits inside the wheel rim. This effectively prevents you from using 14" wheels, or possible even 15" wheels if they have thick cast rims.
2) The upper suspension pivot - whish sits next to the wheel rim - this limits how far inward the rim can reach. Much more than about 3.4" and you'll probably touch. It's vaguely possible that you could use a larger diameter rim that could go around that point (like the rim already does with the tie rod), but even then, moving the rim inwards from that point will reduce the turning circle. Also, assuming you want to be able to swap wheels front and rear, you might have clearance issues on the inner fender at the rear, I forget how snug that is.
3) The rear fenders. Unless you've got rally car suspension, the wheels will need to fit inside the rear fenders. With the inner rim placement dictated by the front suspension, the outer rim placement gets limited by this. 6" rim width with about a 225 tire width is all that will fit (depends on the sidewall height and general bulk of the tire, of course, which varies from brand to brand and model to model). On mine I had to very lightly roll the lip on the fenders to stop the occasional squeak, just parked the car on a flat surface and rolled it back and forth with a 2" wooden dowel in between the tire and fender. The rears have a much less serious fender lip than later cars have, you only get a tiny it more clearance doing that.
With wider tires, the front end will be a little more sensitve to alignment issues, I never noticed one of my kingpin carriers was bent until I put wider tires on it. But steering effort isn't that much higher, mostly at low speeds where it was already a little bit of an arm wrestling match. I occasionally ge a tiny bit of tramlining on lousy pavement. And the traction and control has cone up tremendously over my old skinny 185R15 Beetle tires on the stock wheels. With that and the IPD sways and the bilsteins, it handles like a modern sports sedan.
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'63 PV544 rat rod, '93 Classic #1141 245 +t
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