Aftermarket wheels...how safe are they??

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ACME SS

ACME SS

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Perhaps this should be posted under the tire and wheel category but I'm thinking more broad than just Mopar wheels.
A few weeks back I was held up in traffic on a major highway near me. The reason being was an accident. When I finally got to the scene, there was a small Toyota sedan in the ditch with minor damage. The asphalt was mysteriously grooved in what looked like a spiral graph gone demonic and at the end of the mayhem was a lifted F-150 sitting on nothing but spokes...no rim or rubber to be seen anywhere. I didn't have time to pull out a camera to get a picture but it looked similar to the picture I found on the interweb, posted below. It made me wonder about all these aftermarket wheels and how safe they are? What kind of alloys are they using? Quality inspections, etc... The old chinese cast metal vices with bondo comes to mind.

Anyways, I was just wondering if anyone has any thoughts on the subject. It seems odd you don't hear anything about this ever. Seems like the media went nuts over Firestone tires years back but nothing on this.
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Dollars to donuts, that wheel was made out of chinesium, where Firestone has deep pockets.
Good luck sueing Wong Wei Wheels.

 
Watch out with the cast aluminum wheels. Especially spoked versions.
 
Even though I like to say “Steel is Real!”, my wheel and tire dealer said he had too many complaints and warranty jobs on the offshore production steel wheels he used to sale before the quality bottomed completely out. They would flex so badly they affected the the handling of the vehicle, and then would show up with fatigue cracks in them. I’ve been wondering about the aluminum aftermarket wheels, I guess this confirms my suspensions!
 
Cast is fairly weak. Forged or billet aluminum is quite strong. Same thing with iron. Virgin steel is stronger but most of the metal we see is recycled and not all that good.
 
My low buck MB wheels have held up for 15 or so years on my 4x4. I've tagged a curb caught in a deep gutter where some road work was happening. Just scuffed the rim.
 
Buying aftermarket aluminum wheels is a crap shoot. Just remember, "You get what you pay for". I've run aftermarket wheels for decades, but there were purchased from reputable dealers & were brand name wheels. What all of the manufacturers moving overseas, there is is little of no quality control on products shipped back to the states & sold to the unwary consumer.
 
i would imagine that on a lifted truck more comes into play then just the quality of the rim
the size and pressure of the tire, the total lift of the truck, the quality and match of the lifting component, the intended use of the truck, the actual use of the truck
 
I suspect that some of these wheels are also subjected to loads they were not designed for, both weight and side loads. Add to that the poor quality control and poor materials used in some off-shore manufacturing and you have this sort of problem.
 
All are DOT approved. Probably inspected by design and material only or sample inspected. Worried? Just run plastic rims..yeah!
Radurras by Forgiato
clearwheel3.jpg

Don't think this has been tried before? Mopar did it too. The deep 5-spoke propeller looking wheels on the Dodge Shadow (IIRC) were compressed fiberglass.
 
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I was at an AUTOx when an OEM aluminum (350z) wheel broke off the hub like that at 45-50mph as the car loaded up into a sweeper. On inspection it had a crack for a very long time before it went. Another kid with bargain basement cheap aftermarket wheel had cracks in 3 of 8 spokes. Cracked as cast, hit a pot hole, who knows. Heat cycles are a *****.

Inspecting your wheels at tire rotations is just good practice.
 
I have seen some large (20") wheels that looked very flimsy to me.
I think I'll stick with my centerlines......
I've seen some designs for 3/4, 1ton pickups, that don't look over-stout too.
 
The current trend for extremely slender spokes on large rim diameters was bound to hit up against the limits of metallurgy sooner or later, especially with wider rims on heavy vehicles. Every time I see those "wagon wheels" on a truck, I cringe.
 
It's like anything else. There are really good wheels out there, and there are cheap knock offs out there. There is a wide range of casting techniques and materials that yield very different metallurgic properties.

The Enkei RPF1's I run on my Duster are cast. They're also widely used in auto racing, and the design originally came from F1. Are the F1 wheels a little different? Of course they are. But I've run RPF1's on a couple different cars now and never had an issue with them. But inspecting your wheels occasionally isn't a bad idea either (not my picture or my car)
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But there are also cheap reproductions that look like Enkei RPF1's, and who knows what they're made out of or what the QC looks like.

Bottom line is, ANY rim can fail. It's really easy to slap a set of rims on a vehicle that they technically fit, but don't match up with the vehicle's weight rating or capacity. Like maybe you picked some truck wheels that would be fine on your 3.5 ton truck when it's empty, but not loaded. Stuff like that happens.

And yeah, if you hammer pot holes all day long, nothing last forever. Centerlines fail too, especially the spun racing versions. They can crack at the rivets, and if you ignore the small cracks you can have a catastrophic failure. Even steel wheels can crack, Mercedes Sprinter van wheels are actually known for this, we've had a bunch fail on our ambulances at work.
 
ACME SS said:
Perhaps this should be posted under the tire and wheel category but I'm thinking more broad than just Mopar wheels.
A few weeks back I was held up in traffic on a major highway near me. The reason being was an accident. When I finally got to the scene, there was a small Toyota sedan in the ditch with minor damage. The asphalt was mysteriously grooved in what looked like a spiral graph gone demonic and at the end of the mayhem was a lifted F-150 sitting on nothing but spokes...no rim or rubber to be seen anywhere. I didn't have time to pull out a camera to get a picture but it looked similar to the picture I found on the interweb, posted below. It made me wonder about all these aftermarket wheels and how safe they are? What kind of alloys are they using? Quality inspections, etc... The old chinese cast metal vices with bondo comes to mind.

Anyways, I was just wondering if anyone has any thoughts on the subject. It seems odd you don't hear anything about this ever. Seems like the media went nuts over Firestone tires years back but nothing on this.
View attachment 1715959321
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What's wrong with that ?
 
72bluNblu said:
The Enkei RPF1's I run on my Duster are cast. They're also widely used in auto racing, and the design originally came from F1. Are the F1 wheels a little different? Of course they are. But I've run RPF1's on a couple different cars now and never had an issue with them. But inspecting your wheels occasionally isn't a bad idea either (not my picture or my car)
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I run those on my SC400, but they are "Mitsubishi by Enkei" on the backside, off an older 16.5" Mirage.
 
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72bluNblu said:
even steel wheels can crack, Mercedes Sprinter van wheels are actually known for this, we've had a bunch fail on our ambulances at work.
Click to expand...







Funny you should mention those







I remember as a kid seeing the aluminum Mercedes wheels and wondering why there were little holes in there, in between the bolt pattern







Someone told me that's where they were prone to cracking, and the holes would stop the cracks from splitting the wheel







Not sure if it is true, but that's .what I was told

download.jpeg-3.jpg
 
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