Power Spoke Wheels

  • Thread starter Thread starter Quorn
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insightman said:
I posted that link to illustrate that the wheel bolt holes are in the gray-painted aluminum center. There is clearly a break between the aluminum spokes and the four plastic fillers, but no break between the polished aluminum and the gray-painted aluminum.
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Ok, so the red arrow bit is diamond cut area, not painted silver or anything like that?
 
Love me some aero testing - thanks! Skimming the 2nd article quickly, it's easy to see why folks seem to have difficulty detecting any differences in the real world.
 
fishbert said:
Ok, so the red arrow bit is diamond cut area, not painted silver or anything like that?
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I can't tell if it's painted aluminum or just polished aluminum, but it has a clear-coat over whichever it is. The more I think about it, wheel manufacturers usually paint everything to achieve the exact color they want, so it's probably silver paint. I'm so afraid of scratching my Power Spoke rims that they live in the basement, not on my SE.

For more reference, here's the seldom-seen side of the Power Spoke rims. You can see the back of the 4 plastic pieces. Note the large number of wheelweights required to balance one of these asymmetrical wonders:

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teslarati97 said:
Relative to the other OEM wheel options, they are considerably lighter but they won't fit 16-inch Nokian Hakkapeliitta R5 winter tires.
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For that the 16" Spectre Grey Revolites are the lightweight, aerodynamic choice. I got them for my snow tires, and they weigh 33.2 pounds each with tires/tpms mounted. They were not cheap, though.
 
fishbert said:
Two questions related to power spoke wheels...
  1. Are the rectangular 'plug' outlines diamond cut and subject to corrosion?
  2. Is the yellow mini circle in the middle built into the cover piece, or is it removable? I'm wondering if it's possible to replace it with mini's self-leveling caps.
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The Mini badge and yellow trim are a separate centre cap to the larger wheel cover and the same as any other 5x112 MINI wheel centre cap. I have indeed replaced mine with the floating MINI centre caps, but you need to trim the centre section out with a pair of side cutters to clear the rotating 'float' assembly. This does not stop you from refitting the standard centre cap in the future.
 
Lol I LOVE it! I admire the effort, though I admit I was defo more inclined to just spend four minutes ordering mine from ECS. :cool:
 
chrunck said:
This seems sketchy to me, but maybe it'll be close enough? The weight isn't concentric, so it seems like there would be some variation depending on which way it's turned.
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That, and those fingers might be prone to breaking.
Not to worry, it's not like improperly balanced tires are a safety concern or anything... saving a couple bucks (maybe?) is more important.
 
Something to make @insightman cringe on a Sunday morning… my nephew, an Audi sales advisor and avid VAG geek (on all the forums and FB groups) sent me these just now:

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