- Joined
- May 7, 2021
- Messages
- 45
I took advantage of a Black Friday sale to order some fancy schmancy Billet Specialties "Grand National" replica wheels from AutoStyle. They just arrived today, after weeks of anticipation. First thing I did was mount one to my spin-balancer (without a tire mounted) to measure its runout.
The runout on the inside bead mounting surface is 0.045"!!! That seems completely insane to me. If a customer brought me these wheels to mount tires on them, I'd tell them to send them back immediately. It's almost 4x what I'd normally tolerate. I tried putting the centering cone on the inside, on the outside, used 2 different threaded clamps, and made sure the wheel mounting surface was perfect on both the wheel and the balancer. None of that helped, 0.045" was the number I got every time. Just spinning the wheel on the balancer results in a really bad wobble that terrifies me.
The outside bead mounting surface has a runout of 0.015", which I would normally consider borderline but would try to work with by finding the tire high spot.
I figured this might be a fluke, so I tried a second wheel, and that one had an inside runout of 0.037" and outside of 0.018".
Just to confirm I'm not going crazy, I measured the runout on an old Method Race wheel I had laying around, and I got 0.005". Then I checked an old OE Impala SS wheel, and that was at 0.012". Both of those are sane numbers to me.
Am I being too picky? Is this normal for Billet Specialties wheels? Doesn't seem unreasonable to expect a runout of less than 0.010" on a set of wheels that cost $4000+
If I'd known to expect this, I would've ordered the G-Body Parts GN wheels for less than half the price, instead.
I sent an email to the sales rep, but haven't heard back yet. It's amazing how quickly anticipation has turned into disappointment.
The runout on the inside bead mounting surface is 0.045"!!! That seems completely insane to me. If a customer brought me these wheels to mount tires on them, I'd tell them to send them back immediately. It's almost 4x what I'd normally tolerate. I tried putting the centering cone on the inside, on the outside, used 2 different threaded clamps, and made sure the wheel mounting surface was perfect on both the wheel and the balancer. None of that helped, 0.045" was the number I got every time. Just spinning the wheel on the balancer results in a really bad wobble that terrifies me.
The outside bead mounting surface has a runout of 0.015", which I would normally consider borderline but would try to work with by finding the tire high spot.
I figured this might be a fluke, so I tried a second wheel, and that one had an inside runout of 0.037" and outside of 0.018".
Just to confirm I'm not going crazy, I measured the runout on an old Method Race wheel I had laying around, and I got 0.005". Then I checked an old OE Impala SS wheel, and that was at 0.012". Both of those are sane numbers to me.
Am I being too picky? Is this normal for Billet Specialties wheels? Doesn't seem unreasonable to expect a runout of less than 0.010" on a set of wheels that cost $4000+
If I'd known to expect this, I would've ordered the G-Body Parts GN wheels for less than half the price, instead.I sent an email to the sales rep, but haven't heard back yet. It's amazing how quickly anticipation has turned into disappointment.
