I heard that ya'll might be able to help me out.
Cliff notes:
I have a 98 Prelude base. I'm putting on 17" ROTA subzero wheels. I don't think that the subs will be hubcentric to my center bore. Solution hubcentric rings.
delima:
As many of you probably know having a wheel that is hubcentric is very important to the stabilty of your car, more so in road racing. I think I can get rubber or plastic rings from my prelude to fit the ROTA, but this application seems chicken **** to me. Is it possible to get metal hubcentric rings?
HELP PLEASE.
Any idea one how to get my ROTA hubcentric would be great.
Note: I don't have the ROTAs yet so I don't know for sure about fitment.

 

i have a personal machinist that can make anything for me. He used to work in my factory, now he assembles helicopter engines, and as a hobby, has a machine shop in his basement. He enjoys making racing parts of all kinds for folks in his spare time...

He would easily make your metal rings on his lathe. all he would need is exact dims on the part.

let me know if you need to contact him.

good luck.

Todd
d15b7@aol.com

 

I have heard of people getting metal hubcentric rings from TireRack. They main advantage is that they don't melt themselves onto the rotor and require a chisel to remove.

I recently pushed my car, with plastic rings, to the point that the sidewall of the front tires gave an instant burn if you touched it and the plastic wheel center caps (Rota Circuit 8's) melted and fell off. The hubcentric rings withstood the abuse, but I had to use a chisel to get them off the rotor to put stock wheels back on.

 

Just go to any decent tire shop that sells aftermarket wheels. Most of these places have the metal rings for just about any application by the bucket load and should not have a problem finding some for a Honda...

 

Thanks for all of your responses, My wheels should be here tomorrow so I guess we'll see the fitment.

 

Greg,

Did you get your rings at Tire Rack??

TIA!

Steve

 

Well the Honda Hub is 56.12mm and the Rota bore is 67.00mm if you didn't know.

However I'd get plastic hub rings over metal. If you get the wrong type of metal and it expands when your brakes heat up (over 900 degrees) they may damage your rims or wheel hubs or make it impossible to remove your rims untill they cool and the hub ring retracts to normal size. You really need to think about having them made in metal before you do it.

I understand what you want but you can get Hub rings from Discount Tire for as little as $10-$20 for a set of 4. Hell the last time I went there I got them for free from the manger since I've gotten 2 sets of tires from them and had 2 other remounts done there in the last six months.

 

Are all Rotas 67.00mm, I'm going to go measure my Prelude hub now.
Thanks for the info.

 

Stupid question: Once the lugs a torqued down, what difference does it make if you have the ring or not? I use lugcentric wheels on my RX-7 with no adverse effects. And I haven't balanced them in a while and have shed most of the weights. Car feels fine to 110mph.

 

I just measured my 98 Prelude hub and its around 63.00-64.00mm.
You want your car resting on something more solid than the studs of your lug nuts. That's why you get the hubcentric rings so that the hub of the wheel can rest on the center bore of the rotor. The rings provide that you will get a snug fit.

 

I used to have metal hubcentric rings on some BBS RC's. They worked like a champ. The wheels were aluminum, the hub was steel, and the ring was probably steel.

I hate the crappy plastic rings, but I won't run w/o them. Better safe than sorry. OPM said the only time they (or people they knew) destroyed their Koseis was when they didn't run w/ the ring.

Warren

 

Really, with most of us probably having the rounded-edge Honda lugs or tapered-edge aftermarket lugs, isn't it really the lugs that center the wheel? Just seems to me the ring is handy for keeping the wheel centered until all the lugs are seated and torqued.

Edit: PS I have Kosei K1s with the plastic hub rings and tapered lugs and have had zero problems. Like I said the plastic hub ring initially keeps the wheel centered but it's really the lugs that do the work. A couple people I know with rounded lugs and K1s have lost wheels


[Modified by 4doorH22, 12:48 PM 8/12/2002]

 

I still have the plastic rings which came with the wheels. A friend of mine who road races a GSR got metal rings from tirerack.

 

That's what I thought (hubrings are used to center the wheel while it is being torqued). Logically, and I hope so, there's no way that little dinky piece of metal which is the hub center is going to support the weight of the car under full load... The car's weight is supported by the whole hub mating to the corresponding surface on the wheel.

Actually, the only time i hear about someone's lugs failing it seems to be from over-torquing by using an impact wrench or other non-torquewrench method, not from a lack of hubrings.





[Modified by jsi, 12:47 PM 8/12/2002]

 

The rings are there to center the wheel while it is being installed/torqued. After the lugnuts are tight, they take over the job of supporting the wheel to the hub.

 

Whoa, Seems to me that I wouldn't want my car being supported by lug nut studs, instead that little center bore that is about 10mm thick and goes into the center hub of the wheel would seem to provide a lot of support.
This does make sense though. But I still believe that the center bore does provide a lot of stabilzation.


[Modified by RY8127, 10:56 AM 8/12/2002]

 

What I was trying to say was that the weight of the car is not supported neither by the the little hub center NOR the lugs, but by the friction between the WHOLE flat hub surface and the wheel. Torqued to 80-90 ft-lbs that friction would be something like 30,000lbs between an alloy on a steel hub. I remember someone doing the math during a similar discussion a long while ago on here...

Edit: the llugs are designed to sustain a lateral load only, ie: holding the wheel on to the hub, not for a vertical/torsional load, such as supporting the weight of the car. At least that's what i learned from several discussions on this matter over the years....



[Modified by jsi, 1:00 PM 8/12/2002]

 

Ok got you and yes I don't think anyone would believe the the car's weight is support by that little center hub, but rather distributed around the entire hub/rotor.
Man that's getting really tech with that talk about
I would love to read that thread.

 

Slightly OT, but how many lbs do you torque your lugs for autocross or road race applications? I'm thinking 80 or 90 lbs.

 

I think most Helms say 80 lb ft.

 

I purchased a set of used Kosei K1s recently. Called up the Tirerack today and they're shipping out 4 aluminum rings and cheapy cheapy lug nuts.

But to add to this thread, do I really need to worry about the aluminum expanding to the point of damaging my wheels during an open track/HPDE event?

 

Did you have to give them spec like the diameter, and the depth.

 

For the ring itself? No. I just needed to tell them wheel model, wheel size, offset and what car it was going to be mounted on.