Lotus 26R magnesium alloys

[fueltheburn]

On my neverending quest to find decent lightweight alloys, I came across these.
http://www.superlite-wheels.com/wheelpage.asp?cat=5
I thought they were pretty retro and cool because they were used on the racing Elans now available in 15s

[alanbell]

I am building an elan to fia app k (pre 65 racing) spec. I have been in contact with a scrutineer and he has said that they do not favour mag wheels as they are more prone to cracking and distortion and so are difficult to pass with certainty. as you are aiming for high power output and probable track use that falls short of racing I would advise that you stick to alloys on the grounds of price and durability. the weight saving would only give noticeable improvements to your lap times if you were a top notch driver on the limit.

[fueltheburn]

I hear what you are saying here Alan but on the same note Ferarri, Porsche, Chevrolet and a few others have been using Magnesium alloys on their road cars for years.
The biggest kick for this argument is the 33% weight saving over Aluminium on a typical 15 or 16 inch wheel that is a significant loss on unsprung and rotational mass.
Agreeing with you though - there is no saving a Magnesium wheel once you have bent it, it's scrap.
Still not finished with Magnesium yet though.... I may be beaten soon but not yet

[don.hasi]

I have heard the same problems with Magnesium rims. Yes, they are on some classics, but most of these cars are concours and standing cars.

You have had to analyse them properly (some kind of ultrasound?).

Search for some forged alloy wheels or other light variants.

Don

[alanbell]

if you can afford it why not buy mags for the track and use alloys for the road, many advantages include never kerbing the mags and never using your track tyres on the road. in fact using the standard alloys reduces the extra cost to a set of tyres. good luck what ever you decide

[fueltheburn]

Beleive me Don searching for forged alloys has been an incredibly painful excercise.
I have come to the conclusion that we are stuffed for alloy choice.
The long and the short of it is I am basically going to have to butter up one of the main suppliers to specially cast an alloy that suits the application to achieve the correct PCD and offset or get a split rim made.
This conversation came up a little while ago on Ethels thread when Peter helped and suggested a few lightweight alternatives - most of those however are either now obsolete or the companies have absolutely no interest in catering for a wheel in a low offset
New lightweight wheels are proving to be one of the hardest things I have had the mis-pleasure of searching for.

My stubborness is becuase I want to drop off at least a kilo per wheel and tyre together

Jeff Fenton has made my search a little easier by measuring a bare speedline as I now have a benchmark of 7.5Kg to beat

[fueltheburn]

if you can afford it why not buy mags for the track and use alloys for the road, many advantages include never kerbing the mags and never using your track tyres on the road. in fact using the standard alloys reduces the extra cost to a set of tyres. good luck what ever you decide

Not a silly option - what is more gutting than losing a set of alloys because somebody has stolen them!

[Mr Locust]

Correct maintenance of magnesium wheels is pretty labour intensive with recommendation to strip any coatings and crack test annually or after any impact.

http://www.mb-racingwheels.com/magnesium_protection.htm

[don.hasi]

I complete understand your mission

So some of the lightes alloys are:

oz alleggerita hlt
ATS DTC
Team Dynamics Pro Race2
Motec

There is only thing of it... They are all multi spoke rims. The ats and motecs have a little favour of a 5star rim.... A big challenge

[fueltheburn]

My personal opinion is that the Excel is crying out for a set of 16 inch wheels
My preference would be 16 x 8 wheels with an offset of 5 and a 215/45/16 tyre stretched over it so it slightly fills the arches a little more with a diameter of 600mm.
http://www.willtheyfit.com/index.php?wi ... mit=Submit

The problem as I have seen it. I want to reduce the unsprung and rotational weight but would prefer to use a 16 inch wheel as there is more choice of tyres.
Trying to find a suitable alloy in the right look, weight, offset and price is a nightmare! Welcome to some of the choices I have been looking at. To help others I have created a table.

NAME...............................................STYLE................................SIZE.....................................OFFSET(ET)..........................................WEIGHT(KG)
Original Speedline..................................Disc................................15x7...........................................8........................................................7.5
..... ................................3 piece custom split rim.................15x8...........................................5........................................................4.8
Team Dynamics Pro Race 1.2......Touring car multi-spoke...................16x8..........................................15.......................................................6.8
Volk CE28N...................................8 or 10 spoke...........................16x8...................................To be confirmed............................................5.4
ATS DTC..................................Touring car multi-spoke..................16x8..........................................20.......................................................6.8
AGS DTM Magnesium....................RS500 Cross-spoke......................16x7...........................................5.......................................................6.8
Compomotive MO and CXR.......5 spoke and large cross-spoke............................................................0-35..........................................Heavy but strong
OZ ALLEGGERITA HLT................Slightly dished Multi-spoke............... 16x8

The above were just some of the combinations I looked at but the common theme is that they are not available in the correct offsets so most will require a minimum of a 10mm spacer to be used which obviously adds to the overall weight as well.
The best weight reduction or bang for buck is the Team Dynamics Pro Race 1.2 (15x7 from Demon tweeks = less than 400 pound at the moment)
The AGS DTM is an absolutely gorgeous wheel but too lardy for it's extremely high cost.
The Volk CE28N is an incredibly light wheel for a 16 inch but again you pay for it! Still waiting to see if they the correct offset for this.

Although I badly want 16's but I can't ignore the weight savings that the 3 piece split rim represents, it can also be produced in a number of styles and in the correct offset, PCD and bore.

The question this leaves me with now is one of balance for the tyre fitment. The car will only be used in the summer so will be looking for summer orientated performance tyres. I have also significantly lightened the tail end so am considering changing the rear tyres to a slightly larger footprint to compensate.

I have a few options here as well:

SIZE.......................TYPE......................DIAMETER
215/50/15............Toyo R888.................... 596mm

225/50/15............Toyo R888....................606mm
.........................Toyo T1R...............................

205/55/15.............Toyo T1R.....................606mm


205/50/15..........Yokohama AD08................586mm
.........................Toyo R1R.................................
.........................Toyo R888..............................
.........................Toyo T1R.................................



225/45/15.............Toyo R888..................583.5mm
...........................Toyo R1R..............................


Choice of tyre and wheel setups =

1. 215/50/15 all round on 7.5 inch wide wheel with ET8 (only available as R888 semi-slick)
http://www.willtheyfit.com/index.php?wi ... mit=Submit
2. 225/50/15 all round on 8 inch wheel with ET5
http://www.willtheyfit.com/index.php?wi ... mit=Submit
3. 205/50/15 at front on 7.5 inch wide wheel with ET8, 225/45/15 at rear on a 8 inch wide wheel with ET5
http://www.willtheyfit.com/index.php?wi ... mit=Submit
4. 205/55/15 at front on 7.5 inch wide wheel with ET8, 225/50/15 at rear on a 8 inch wide wheel with ET5
http://www.willtheyfit.com/index.php?wi ... mit=Submit

Long and the short of it - I think I have decided on a wheel supplier and size but unsure whether to go the same size all round with a semi-slick or high performance road tyre or go for a larger rear and smaller front setup.
Yes I am up at 2:30am thinking about this

[RRHANS]

I have konig rewind wheels with the correct pcd and offset 0.
They fit perfectly and cost 600 us$/ set .
I imported them from the US.

You can have them in 16x7 7,35 kg or 15x7 6,57 kg.

No spacers, good quality and cheap as chips.

I have uniroyal rainsport on them front 205 45 16, rear 225 45 16.
I first had 225 40 16 on the back and they are to harsh.
If the fronts are gone i will also put 225 45 16 on them

[don.hasi]

the compomotive 5star rims -which look pretty well - have the similar look like the speedline corse. And these ones are also available in Magnesium

[fueltheburn]

When I get back to land I will phone up Demon-tweeks to see what wheels they do just before I confirm I want to go custom

If I wasn't so pedantic about the weight I would happily have a whole heap of alloys to choose in the correct sizes.
For anyone else looking for wheels do yourself a favour and go to Ebay.COM not .co.uk

Type in "AE86 corolla wheels" or alloy and see how many different styles you get back
The americans have a heap of tasty wheels that will fit the Excel in a 0 to 5 offset

I will be looking there later for a decent wheel for my other project which is not so weight critical and will be more for aesthetics.

Side-note: I have always liked those 5 spokes but remember what Peter was saying about flat modern wheels on the Excel not being dished enough and not complimentary to the looks and styling of the Excel. I do sometimes think that a wheel can look better in the flesh on a car than pictures can sometimes show.
I would like to see what the 5 spokes looked like on the car before dishing out for a wheel that does nothing for the styling.

[don.hasi]

I think they look good on MrCoolA s car errr ok, you have to wipe away the colour of the car in your mind... So the wheels get more attention to jump over the colour of the car

[smithersoli]

Go 17's !!

Have sold my spare sets now, but I think the 17 looks ok once you get used to it, although I accept that it might look slightly too large at first sight if you are used to the standards.