Custom widened Weds!

['69 2800cs]

I recently sent my 14x7 Weds out to Wheelflip (wheelflip.com) to get the rears widened to 14x8. They cut the original 2.5 outer off and welded on a new 3.5 outer.

All the width was added to the outside so they were ET11 before the swap, they are now ET0. (if you're doing the math on the outers the centers move the offset a bit.)

Cost was about $250 per wheel. Service and turnaround was good, but they sent them back unassembled so I had a little work to do.

I got the look I wanted...I've never liked the narrower track in the rear and this fills out the wells nicely. Tires are 195/70/14 Michelins.

 

[dave v. in nc]

Nicely done.

 

[Stevehose]

Fantastic

 

[Markos]

Very nice! I'm building a set of staggered 16x9 and 16x8 WEDS. I've talked to all of the shops including Alex at wheel flip. More in early 2017...

 

[Vitaliy semenyuk]

Looks great!

 

[WISE9UY]

They look fantastic and thanks for sharing for inspiration. I am also building wheels over winter to be ready for the vintage next year and will be going for a 3.5" rear dish. It is surprising that the original depth was 2.5" as they look shallower... perhaps the contrasting depth of the rears just makes it look that way. Nice stance too. What springs are you running?

 

[Stan]

Very nice, I have always liked the WEDS. When the Michelins time out or wear out go for 225 x 60 x 14. They will fill out the wheel wells even better!

 

[vince]

Bravo!! They look great!

I completely agree with you about the narrower track in the rear. I have staggered style 5s (17x8&9s) which weren't easy to find.

 

[zinz]

Beautiful... very nicely done.

Ed

 

['69 2800cs]

Thanks guys! I toyed with replacing all inners and outers and going to 15's or 16's, but at 2-250 per half it'd be spendy, even though 9's could be done in the rear for sure. Markos-looking forward to your project.

Springs are ground control coil overs in the front with a 6" spring sitting on stock spring perches. I am using their adjustable camber plates as well. Travel in the front is 2.5 inches-the minimum GC recommended. Rears are stock with maybe 1.5 coils cut.

I thought about the 225/60/14's, it would look great and they might just fit but I went safe and for something I could get front and rear. My 195's occasionally rub in the front, even with 1.5 degrees negative camber. I was also worried about tire clearance in the rear...this outer rim sticks out 1 inch more than both the 14" and 16" Alpinas. The rear wheel housing steel is thick at the edge and it's likely spot welded there so I can't imagine rolling the rear lips like I did at the front.

On the dish, if you look at the original picture you can see the old inner and new outer. The original inner is 4.5", that's measured from where the barrels are welded together to the tire mounting area. The original outer was 2.5, but the the center sits on top of that, hiding some of it.

Anyway, it was a cool project!

 

[Markos]

Thanks guys! I toyed with replacing all inners and outers and going to 15's or 16's, but at 2-250 per half it'd be spendy, even though 9's could be done in the rear for sure. Markos-looking forward to your project.

Thanks. They should look almost identical but the inner barrels will be 1" wider font and back. I've spent some time researching the manufacturing process for spun aluminum wheels and I should see a significant cost savings over the typical $200+ per custom lip that you see with most wheel builders.

 

[Markos]

Hi Todd,

Your wheels look absolutely amazing and serve as a huge motivation for my little endeavor. I need to order my custom lips and barrels by next week and I'm trying to piece all of this together. I had a few questions about your setup so I figured I would post them here if you don't mind. It's late and this probably reads like a high school math problem at the moment. I'll revisit in the morning. The good thing about this is that I know that our faces will be the same dimensions, and that you can fit 3.5" lips in the rear, and 2.5" up front. I'm starting only with a wheel face, so now I have a reference point to work with.

Just to confirm - you only modified your rears correct? It's a bit hard to tell in the pic, but I assume that you couldn't squeeze 3.5" lips under the front fender. I didn't realize that I could fit 3.5's in the rear until I revisited your thread. This puts a smile on my face.

As far as offset, I was wondering if you saw ET11 stamped on the wheel or if you calculated this. You mentioned that the barrel was 4.5" wide from the weld to the tire bead seat, which is the proper way to measure the width. So I figure the barrel is actually closer to 5" wide in total. Did you do the same for the 2.5" lip?

I built this little offset calculator in Excel for my WEDS, and I'm calculating your a 7" wheel with a 4.5" barrel at zero offset. That's 4.5" + 2.5" = 7". The face mounts at 4.5", and the flange is 1" back from that at 3.5", which is also the centerline of the wheel (aka ET0). Now if you factor in the thickness of the original WEDS lip, it could be around ET4 - ET6 or so. For those reading who are unfamiliar with WEDS, the assembly pattern is barrel + lip + face. The faces sit on the lips, they are not sandwiched between the lip and the barrel. The 4mm that I'm referencing is the thickness of the aluminum used on the lip.

The move to a 3.5" lip actually sets the offset to -12.7mm in the rear according to my calcs. Again, I'm not factoring in the gauge of metal (likely .190") of the new lip in this equation, which adds about 4mm to the offset.

Screenshot of my calculator. Note that the image that my calculator generates does't actually display the extra .5" outside of the bead seat, but it doesn't matter for the calculation.

 

[JimV]

The wheels look great, Todd, and fill the wheel arches nicely.

Here is tool which I have found to be helpful..I'm not clever enough to make my own.

http://www.1010tires.com/Tools/Wheel-Offset-Calculator

Cheers,
Jim

 

[Markos]

The wheels look great, Todd, and fill the wheel arches nicely.

Here is tool which I have found to be helpful..I'm not clever enough to make my own.

http://www.1010tires.com/Tools/Wheel-Offset-Calculator

Cheers,
Jim

Thanks Jim! Most wheel calculators are designed around modifying existing wheels, where you start with known wheel sizes with known offsets and and an inch or two here or there. I just own the wheel faces so I'm using Excel.

 

[Honolulu]

Gonna get that done to 5 rims just in case? Things happen... I have a bent spare, didn't feel it while running but I could see that it wasn't round.

 

[Markos]

Gonna get that done to 5 rims just in case? Things happen... I have a bent spare, didn't feel it while running but I could see that it wasn't round.

Good call! That would be ideal but since my wheels will be staggered I would need to order four separate parts as spares! I have a wheel straightening shop in Seattle that I use, or I can have a new lip or barrel made.

 

['69 2800cs]

Markos-I think your math is spot on....to answer your questions in order-

I only modified the rears. It would have been cool to do all inners and outers and go to 15's, but budget got in the way. Outers only in the rear was affordable and gave most of the impact I wanted.

There are no ET markings on the wheels at all. I was wrong on ET11 though, I think it is more like ET5 or so.

I did measure the 4.5 and the 2.5 the same way, where the barrel meets to the outer edge of the tire bead area. The overall width was likely 7.5 as you state, but truly a 7" wheel.

One thing you should confirm, and it sounds like you already have, is that your centers have the same dimensions from the wheel mounting face to the face of where the center sits on the lip of the outer barrel. I get 25mm for that. I got closer to 5mm for the barrel thickness so my 2.5 outer and 4.5 inner means the barrel joint is 25mm from the mounting face. Subtracting the 25mm for the way the centers move the offset then adding back the 5mm I get an ET5 for the fronts.

In the rear I have a 3.5 outer and a 4.5 inner, so that would be a 12mm distance from the barrel joint to the centerline of the wheel. Adding the 20mm for the center I get an ET-8.

Looking at your face height in Excel I think that you should use 20mm. Here are the pics, I measured from the wheel mounting face to the edge where the barrel mounts at 25mm, or 20mm if I'd measured from the joint where the inner and outer meet.

 

['69 2800cs]

Picture

 

[Markos]

Markos-I think your math is spot on....to answer your questions in order-

I only modified the rears. It would have been cool to do all inners and outers and go to 15's, but budget got in the way. Outers only in the rear was affordable and gave most of the impact I wanted.

There are no ET markings on the wheels at all. I was wrong on ET11 though, I think it is more like ET5 or so.

I did measure the 4.5 and the 2.5 the same way, where the barrel meets to the outer edge of the tire bead area. The overall width was likely 7.5 as you state, but truly a 7" wheel.

One thing you should confirm, and it sounds like you already have, is that your centers have the same dimensions from the wheel mounting face to the face of where the center sits on the lip of the outer barrel. I get 25mm for that. I got closer to 5mm for the barrel thickness so my 2.5 outer and 4.5 inner means the barrel joint is 25mm from the mounting face. Subtracting the 25mm for the way the centers move the offset then adding back the 5mm I get an ET5 for the fronts.

In the rear I have a 3.5 outer and a 4.5 inner, so that would be a 12mm distance from the barrel joint to the centerline of the wheel. Adding the 20mm for the center I get an ET-8.

Looking at your face height in Excel I think that you should use 20mm. Here are the pics, I measured from the wheel mounting face to the edge where the barrel mounts at 25mm, or 20mm if I'd measured from the joint where the inner and outer meet.

Thanks a bunch Todd! Super helpful! Did you see my pic above with the exact measurement of the face height? It's almost exactly 1". Gary is going through this exercise with his Weds as well.

 

['69 2800cs]

No, it's funny, I can see that there is supposed to be a third image below your excel pictures, (very cool, btw) but it is not showing on my screen.