Hi All,

Just took my car down to get the alloy wheels refurbed only to be told that they've already been done and my only option now is to have them sprayed. Gloss Black, Silver, dull chrome, etc

questions:-
a) has anyone sprayed turbines? How do they look? got a photo?

b) 4x new LR turbines are £5,448 #gulp# anyone heard of any originals cheaper? (I'm worried to buy from ebay second hand because they may have been refurbed already and so not be possible again in future or be cracked, warped etc)

c) any replicas that anyone can suggest/recommend? But concerned about replicas being less tested and resilient than originals. any advice here?

thanks

Andrew --
On my third Full Fat RR
there's nothing like it.

You can buy some from here with confidence:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/Wheels-with-Tyr...el_brokers

Have been to their place - got mine fitted by them.

It's a proper company with quality service. What do I put here then?

these guys look like they're respraying alloys? I have a company who can do that for £60/wheel --
On my third Full Fat RR
there's nothing like it.

They're definitely not.

But at the end of the day it's your car and your money. So you need to be 100% happy. What do I put here then?

Depending on the level of damage, it's a very simple DIY task to repair diamond cut wheels. You just need a bit of wet and dry paper, cutting compound and some clear lacquer to apply over the top.

As you know, refurb companies just want to bang it on a lathe and machine the face down but in many instances, this isn't needed.

Here's one I did in about 30 mins when I had an unfortunate run-in with a kerb a year or so back... Kev

2014 L405 RR Vogue SE 4.4 SDV8 in Corris Grey
2010 L320 RRS HSE 3.0 TDV6 in Stornoway Grey

impressive fix kev. You'd think someone would be able to come and do that job. like a chipsaway or something. I have four wheels that need help. --
On my third Full Fat RR
there's nothing like it.

GAC23 wrote:

They're definitely not.

But at the end of the day it's your car and your money. So you need to be 100% happy.

The ones I bought were genuine.

And I saw lots of other genuine wheels when I was there.

It's a proper, decent company. No some backstreet outfit. What do I put here then?

I had a bad experience with replica wheels, although not on a FFRR.

Wife had a Merc and unbeknown to me the wheels were replica. 3, yes 3, cracked due to minor potholes within 3 months! The garage said they were also not running straight, even the undamaged one. They were also incredibly heavy compared to proper ones.

I think there are probably good quality replicas out there, but I would personally save up and get a real set.

@philip1972 - your experience of Mercedes wheels cracking isn't exclusive to replicas, or indeed Mercedes.

I have(had) a set of 19" Volkswagen 'Pretoria' alloys on my Golf R - they're a factory option, and the best looking wheel VW fit to the Golf (IMHO) however, they are made, it would appear entirely out of chocolate. I had 5 cracks welded and all of the wheels straightened at least once.

When I took them to Wheel specialists in Milton Keynes (TRS - who incidentally also refinished the Style 14 wheels on my old 322) they indicated this was not uncommon amongst VW, Audi, BMW, Mercedes and Tesla... the cars are getting heavier, the wheel diameters are getting larger, tyres thinner and the potholes are getting worse.

Upon returning from repair, they lasted 6 months before one cracked again... (a previously unwelded one) and so I bought some stronger wheels from Racing Line (formerly VW Racing) and these have so far been OK.

I pondered getting some replica 'Pretoria' style wheels from a company that seems highly regarded in enthusiast circles - but decided against them in the end in favour of the Racing Line wheels.

@GAC23 - that ebay link seems to be an incomplete link - it takes me to search results for "wheels-with-tyr...el_brokers" Andrew.

Same problem with the link here but I thought it was me Chris

2014 FFRR 4.4 SDV8 Autobiography Barolo Black
2012 RRS SDV6 HSE Baltic Blue
and before I saw the light:
2011 Suzuki Grand Vitara SZ5
1998 Ford Mondeo V6 Ghia X
1990 Citroen BX GTi
1973 Triumph GT6

My wife has an R which she’s had from new, it’s close to 4 years old and has done 40k miles with no issues. We run the Pretoria’s alongside a set of winter wheels/tyres, so it’s probably more like 25k miles. Either lucky, careful or both! MY23 Panamera E-Hybrid
MY19 SDV8 Autobiography - Sold

We bought ours at 3 years old and we've had it 5 years... it's done about 45k.

The Pretorias have probably covered 20k of the total... we discovered the first cracked wheel after about 2 weeks of ownership when we had a soft tyre which we assumed was a slow puncture...

One of the wheels subsequently buckled so we bought a set of the 18" Cadiz wheels to run on the car until we could decide how to proceed given that brand new wheels were around £1k each from VW... when we decided to see if they could be repaired we had the tyres taken off, and noticed the other cracks....

We thought we were careful, so you might just be lucky..... unless VW used a different manufacturer or changed the design slightly on later cars... ours are made by Borbet.

Then again, using different wheels in the winter will no doubt help!

Given how much better they look, and how much lighter they are than the 18" Cadiz, it surprising how much better the car feels on the 18's although not enough for me to not revert to some 19's

Also, given the experience with the 19's I am wary now that my recently acquired 405 is running on the 22" Turbines.... they were not my first choice of wheel but the rest of the spec on the car was right....

It certainly feels a lot more 'crashy' and susceptible to terrible road surfaces than it's predecessor did on the 20's with 205/50's on it but I'm not sure if that's just an L405 vs. L322 thing...

....and given that the same wheel place who fixed the Golf wheels refurbed my Style 14's on that car also had to repair some buckling on those wheels... I am not optimistic that the 22's will survive too long unless my local council decide to resurface the roads which are in an atrocious state - and let's face it, there's more chance of diesel dropping back below £1/litre than that happening.... Andrew.

GAC23 wrote:

The ones I bought were genuine.

And I saw lots of other genuine wheels when I was there.

It's a proper, decent company. No some backstreet outfit.

Had mine done the other week, almost a match for dark atlas;