by Manaz » Wed Apr 09, 2014 9:36 pm
Basically - what it comes down to is that you must maintain the same rolling diameter across all four wheel/tyres. If you don't, you'll screw your centre diff, as the front wheels and rear wheels will rotate at different speeds (and have different friction co-efficients, and this will cause friction in the centre diff that will eventually cause it to fail).
For what it's worth, it's also a bad idea to run different tyre sizes front to rear - 225/45R17 front and 235/45R17 rears as an example is enough to cause grief, even though the difference in rolling diameter is really tiny.
Different offsets aren't an issue (at least for the diffs, it can have an impact on handling because it impacts on front/rear track), as the rolling diameters remain the same (assuming the same tyre width/profiles).