Why are some cars four-lug and some five-lug? Options

[Coomer]

Why are some cars four-lug, while others are five-lug? To me, it seems like a lot of nicer cars have five-lug.

For example, the third gen. Integras are all 4-lug, except the Type R which is 5-lug.

The fourth gen. Celica GT and ST in the US are 4-lug, but the nicer GT-S and even nicer All-Trac are 5-lug.

The fifth gen. Celica ST is 4-lug, while the nicer other models are all 5-lug.

So why do manufacturers decide to make some cars 4-lug and others 5-lug? It seems to me like 5-lug maybe adds a bit more weight, but is marginally safer because it's one more lugnut for protection in case others fail. It also seems slightly more expensive to make a 5-lug setup because of more materials. But I dunno...anyone have any good explanation for this?

[Kwanza26]

It's because of parts sharing... IMO Toyot couldn't even decide what engine to put into the 4th gen Celica ST/GT when they first came out. The GT/ST are essentially the same car minus some options. The GTS, different car. Being (almost) top of the line for the time, they wanted to put the best stuff on it. What better incentives than to throw down alltrac brakes all the way around? As for the 5th gens... the 4 lug ST was only till 91 or 92 I think. All of the later models were 5 lug. Again, part sharing. They probably had a lot of the old 4th gen 4 lug hubs/spindles left over and wanted to clear them out.

As for Honda, the ITR uses different brakes for the fronts, so the rears are done to match. That would be my best guess. Stock power is also a good reason...