Damage Control
The inside story on repairing damaged alloy and steel rims.
By Michael Knowling & `Space : )
Imagine you're blasting up your favourite stretch of blacktop in your modifiedMonte Carlowith yourfriend egging you on to go faster-faster. Everything's going hunky-dory and you're threading the car through corners as if you're a true racing driver. But then you lapse concentration just for a moment, get it all crossed up and screeeeeech - crack! In a blink, you've just clouted the gutter at high speed. You get out to check the damage and sure enough, you've buckled to hell your new aftermarket rim, and the tire's deflated and hanging off. It's a sad sight. Don't feel too badly though, it's a common story of woe for those with a taste for speed. The good news is that you can return that sorry-looking rim back to virtually good-as-new condition.
We took our cameras and the rest of our journo junk along to Adelaide Wheel and Rim Works, who showed us step-by-step how they can save your bacon. The rim that we followed through the process was a customer's 15 x 6.5 inch ROH Ritz that had struck a gutter heavily. Each major city has similar rim repairers available.
Inspect the Damage

[/align][/align]The very first step in determining whether or not your rim can be repaired is to thoroughly inspect the damage. Rims that have been bent level to near the centre section are repairable, but beyond this it's likely that the entire wheel has been buckled - which means you'll have to replace it with a new one. In most cases, the lip that extends outward from the rim and forms its outer edge is the part that gets bent first. Steel rims are simple to fix - they're simply bent back into shape.


[/align][/align]For an aluminium rim, damage like this is generally repairable so long as it has only been bent in by around 45 degrees or less (depending slightly on the radius of the bend). Over and above this 45 degrees it is likely that the aluminium has been finely cracked. This can usually be identified by a "scaley" surface appearance - and if this is the case, it's advisable to replace the wheel. Essentially, steel rims can be repaired in all but the most severe cases, while alloys are prone to cracking if they've been subjected to major stress. Most of the time though, damaged alloy rims remain crack-free and so can be fixed. [/align]
Rehab Step 1

[/align][/align][b]The first hands-on step in restoring a rim to its former glory is to lever it back into its general shape. Steel wheels can simply be held in a press and bent using a lever bar, but both forged and cast alloy wheels require pre-heating prior to bending. How much he

 

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