17" wheel sadness

17\" wheel sadness

Has anyone ever measured the run-out of their wheels?

I think I'll be making a new coffee table out of my rear wheels.

Bought a new set of 17" wheels because as we all know there is no high speed rubber available for 15" wheels (unless you go for bias ply racing slicks). Initially the rear wheels had .025 and .055 of an inch run-out but the center knock offs wouldn't even tighten so the wheels went back. A new and higher center has been welded on so they now can actually be tightened down. Bad part is the rear wheel run-out is now .065 and .085 of an inch.

A Road Force Balancer originally said the .055 run-out was worth about 50 pounds of weight at highway speeds. I would assume I'd be seeing 70 - 80 pound thumper if this wheel was to be used. This is what we used to call square wheels.

So back to the original question: has anyone measured the runout on their wheels and if so what did you get?

This could only happen to me.

Mark

 

[Alex Hirsbrunner]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Mark,

0.065" is the radial runout that I have one of the SVO wheels I am using. The thing to note is that it is not the wheel, but the wheel + tire that makes the difference. The tires I am running (Yoko A032R) have about 0.030 radial runout (unmounted) as a result of mfg tolerances. Proper use of the a road force balancer will result in lining up of the high spot of the tire with the low spot of the rim. For example, after mounting the tires, I was down to 0.045 radial runout.

For passenger cars, I believe the ford guideline for wheel replacement is if the wheel tire assembly cannot be brought to at or under 0.080" (radial)

Here's some info that may be useful:

http://www.gsp9700.com/

Regards,

Al H.

 

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Al,

Thanks for the info. Really not all that conforting knowing I paid $800 a piece for wheels the Ford would j-u-s-t allow in at the bad end of the specs. Not really what I was planning on since I want to run these at top speed. Guess I can try them at 180 and see if they shimmy and push it harder if it's smooth. The hard part will be going home not achieving top speed because of an out of round very expensive wheel. P.o.S. Engineering. Been making wheels for 26 years so we should know what we're doing. Guess again. "Should" being the operative word here.

Mark

 

[Alex Hirsbrunner]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Mark,

If all else fails, you can get your tires trued (shaved) to < 0.015 runout at some speciality alignment shops. I happen to be lucky and had this done in the past just down the street from me. One other thing I would mention is that if the wheel is designed to be hubcentric (i.e. it locates precisely on the hub of the rotor), and you are only using the lugnut cones to center the wheel, this can cause extra runout. if your wheel does not center on the hub, you can purchase hubcentric adapters here:

http://justforwheels.com/index.jsp?cat=hubcentric⊂=how&track=GHR

Of course, they didn't have what I needed and had to have them made at emachineshop.com for about $100. Like you suggested you can also try rotating your wheels/tires 180 (or whatever) and selecting the combination that gives the best reading. One thing that the hubcentric adapters do is to reduce lateral runout which can cause steering shake as opposed to the updown vibration that the radial runout causes.

Hoping you have a vibration free future,

Al

 

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Mine are pin drive or knock-offs or knock-ons if you're on the other side of the big pond.

You can see how the center web section was welded to the 10" wide wheel section. I almost believe it's distorted because of a continuous weld that caused the center to be not perpendicular to the wheel. If the center had been tacked at 2 places 180 degrees apart and then 2 more 180 apart and 90 degrees to the first welds there might have been less distortion. Basic welding but I guess if you make wheels for more than 26 years you don't need to worry about basic welding. It's easier to slam out cheap parts for big bucks and hope no one puts a dial indicator to your work.

It's $3200 of cheesey garbage. So I'm reluctant to shave .085" off one side a good set of tires to accommodate cheesey garbage wheels.

I'll run them. If they shimmy they will become a coffee table. You can bet I'll never get another set from this dude.

Mark

 

[Alex Hirsbrunner]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

This really is sad. You can bet that I will call you before I ever buy any knock off wheels just to make sure it's not the vendor that made this mess for you.

Al

 

[Howard Jones]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Have you tried to discuss the issue with the wheel maker? If not why not. I would return them and ask to have the problem corrected. Then, and only then, if I had a problem I would complain loudly.

Nobody, not even me, can do the same thing over and over for 20+ years and not make mistakes. Its the "make right" that counts.

Lastly try the wheel that is out on the other side of the car just to make sure it's not somthing else. Pin drive adapter, hub, etc.

 

[scott]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Sorry to hear of your experience and thank you so much for sharing. In the interest of learing from other's misfortune, who will you choose to make the next set of wheels?
-Scott

 

[Gregg]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Mark, I am sorry to hear of your dilemma. I was just about to order wheels from Phil until I read your post. Have you contacted him re the problem? If so what is he willing to do about it? Thanks. Gregg

 

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Howard,

When the wheels arrived originally the center section was not tall enough (thick enough) to allow you to tighten the center spinner. I return shipped the wheels and got ERA to send him a drawing. His claim was he only makes one wheel for all ERAs. Well my original set is different than the new set so I know he at least made two at some point and ERA has made no changes.

So I returned the wheels with an additional request that they be centered up and the run-out be fixed. Nothing was done with respect to those surfaces but they did manage to get welding pits on the polished surface and they're all scratched up to boot.

There is some run-out (.003) on the pin drive hub assembly so maybe I can experiment and get the one to offset the other to minimize the total overall run-out. The original .025 and .055 was measured on a road force balancer.

I usually give someone who has erred a chance to make it right. When they blow that chance I usually don't deal with them again and eat the loss and repair them myself or use them in a static display to remind me of the levels of quality I see and what people will tell you so they can make a buck. Sad.

Scott,

I am now presently searching for a new wheel maker. Suggestions are being accepted. I don't mind paying for quality. But I expect more than lower limit Detroit production quality for that cost.

Greg,

Who said Phil? I usually won't trash another manufacturer in public unless they're especially ignorant and arrogant about their situation. I said P.o.S. Engineering.

Thank you all for the compassion. I'll just have to look at is as another minor hurdle to exceeding 200 mph and move on. I actually expected them to come back minimally usable so I immediately accepted the fact I squandered $3200 plus shipping. Glad I don't have a corporate board needling me for not making these milestones. Hey what's another 6 months to try to achieve your goal. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif Thanks Phil.

Mark

 

[Gary Gibbs]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Mark. I am wondering the same thing. I was considering going for a custom wheel center in BRM where it could be used with BBS (or others) rims in a three piece arangement. It would allow the offset and width to be taylored to suit. I am guessing you could go with blind tapped holes (helicoils?) so that the bolts do not show. Would want to stick with a rim maker that uses a high bolt count (say 40). I did speak to several manufacturers at SEMA, but need to put together a CAD drawing of the center. I do not have any data or wheel to go by and at this point would be relying on photos, etc.

 

[Ron McCall]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Doesn't Vintage make a 17" knock off Halibrand style wheel?
For much less to boot.

 

[Peter Delaney]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Sacreligious I know, BUT, bolt-on wheels are so much more reliable than knock-offs (just ask any old MG owner). The simple solution is to go with bolt-ons, & add a cover plate which is held in place by a fake knock-off spinner.

I have the 17" wheels & fake spinners so far - the cover plates are down the list a bit, but I'll post some pics when they are done.

Kind Regards,

Peter D.

 

[Alex Hirsbrunner]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Mark,

OK this may be suggesting throwing good money after bad, but as I was looking through AutoWeek, I noticed (and I should have remembered) that there are a couple of aluminum wheel repair companies that advertise in the classified section. I don't know if they can fix the runout on an improperly machined wheel, but based on some of the photos of horribly bent/stretched rims that were repaired, I would say it is probably possible to improve/eliminate runout (plus they can repair/refinish the scratches you mentioned). If you do a google there are quite a few companies that come up as well. I seem to recall an article in a mustang pub that indicated it was a relatively (esp compared to $700 a wheel) inexpensive process.

Al

 

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Al,

Just got back from having the wheels and tires re-balanced with the Road Force balancer. We managed to get them within reasonable specs. The one front wheel is .030" out of round. The back ones had .055" wobble. Something I'd expect from Walmart or at a Blue Light Special at K-Mart. Considering these are CNC cut wheels it's nice to know he can stamp out high priced crap at a predictable rate in a consistent fashion.

By repeatedly rotating the tire on the wheel we managed to align each item's eccentricity so the balancer stopped complaining. So I'm going to try them. If I get any bad vibrations I'll shelve them or give re-machining a shot.

And that was $800 a wheel.

New Konis and Eibachs look great. Just thought I'd throw that in.

Mark

 

[Bill D]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Mark-

Have you tried http://www.jongbloedracing.com/

Cheers
Bill D

 

[Ian Clark]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Hi Mark and gang,

For what it's worth the factory supplied BRM 15" wheels for CAVs have less than .005 run out. All our tires are force balanced and the tire shop said these are the truest wheels they've ever had on the machine (including all kinds of big name cnc "billet" parts).

Unfortunately we still don't have a supplier of z rated 15" rubber so I'll be going down the 17" road too, though not untill I have the run out problem licked.

Good luck with your wheels.

 

[Gary Gibbs]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

[ QUOTE ]

New Konis and Eibachs look great.


[/ QUOTE ]
Hi Mark. Which model Konis did you go with?

 

[Tom]

Re: 17\" wheel sadness

Mark,

I don't know how important absolute authenticity is to you, but you might try looking at wheels from Kodiak Motorsport. He CNC cuts all of his centers from Billet or forgings, and he's got a pattern that is fairly similar to the hildebrand. If you look up Kodiak motorsport, they show a selection of equipement including various wheel designs, on the front page. The left most wheel is the design I'm thinking about. It's kind of a modern rendition of the Hildebrand - a little cleaner. Anyway, he (Daryle) builds race wheels which are pretty light, very straight, and reasonable priced. In fact, they are a good deal less expensive than the POS wheels you got.

If you have any questions, give Daryle a call, he's a pretty friendly and straight-forward guy.

Tom (no affiliation with Kodiak)