Alright... hopefully y'all can help me settle a bet going on between my buddy and I...

I've got a set of 95 GSR rims on my Civic... In order to make the fastbrakes.com 11" Wilwood brake kit fit, I had to trim some material off of the caliper, and some material from the backside of the spokes, approximately 1-2mm from the spokes. My buddy is convinced that the wheel will fail soon. I am convinced that due to the fact that Brian at fastbrakes.com fit the 95 GSRs onto his car with no required trimming of the rim, that my wheels were on the thicker side of factory tolerance... and by my trimming them represents no long-term damage to the wheel.

Who's right? I've got $50 that says I'm right!

 

Can't you just run a spacer and some longer studs?

Warren

 

Depends, how did you trim them? If you used a grinder.... and you heated up the metal, you could have introduced additional strain into the grain of the metal and/or tiny stress fractures. The amount of actual material isnt really the case, as its a cast peice (i assume cast wheel).

-Ryan

 

Are you sure he used exactly the same factory wheel with the exact same dimensions and offset? What car is he mounting these 95 GSR wheels and 11" Wilwoods to?
Maybe a different rotor/hub combo?
I would not trust the integrity of your trimmed wheels.

 

Shaving the wheel can't possibly be doing the structural integrity of it any good. I wouldn't run at high speed on those - too much risk of hurting yourself and others on the track or road.
Buy different wheels...

 

There is also a balancing issue there. Never, ever going to be able to machine the backs of all the spokes exactly the same. THere will be some vibration at higher speeds, and that could be disastrous.

 

Shoot! It doesn't seem like much of an issue...

I'm already running spacers... I can't afford new wheels AND new brakes!

Balance is OK--no difference felt so far, even up to 115mph.

Material was taken off w/ an angle grinder.


[Modified by PyroVTEC, 12:34 AM 2/20/2002]

 

Not to come off as a *****... but I don't think any of us can afford a wheel failure through say Hogpen at 80+mph.

 

If you can afford to go 115 mph on a public road, then you can afford new wheels.

Maybe you should have thought about that *before* you took a grinder to your wheels, hmm? Spacers are much cheaper than a broken wheel (that probably will lead to a totalled car).

-Ryan

 

sigh... okie guys... thanks for the input... time to go shopping for wheels...