I found out the hard way today that our rims are not just clear-coated, they're painted. This means that you can really scar up the paint inside the lugholes removing and reinstalling the wheels!

I went to a dyno today; it's a dynopack where, instead of strapping the car onto rollers, they remove the wheels and attach the dyno to the lugs. I asked the guy to be really careful, not use an impact wrench, etc. Nevertheless, after the run I looked at the wheels and there are scars inside the lugholes from the sockets. I showed it to the guy and he insisted that they used special alloy thin-wall sockets. He was apologetic & willing to work with me about it, but I had to admit that he had a point when he said that wheels really need to be able to hold up better than that.

A friend (Eric1h) who was with me (I have Track, he has Touring) used his OEM lugwrench and even with that you could see scuffing inside the lugholes. I'm going to contact the dealer about touch-up paint, but this has me bummed. I guess those beautiful Rays won't be so beautiful any more!

Here's a couple of pics of a representative lughole, not the worst, just average:

 

ouch.. that really sucks, man. sorry to hear about your car. hopefully you and that guy can work something out when you get those fixed, or if he replaces them for you. i've adjusted the lugnuts on my track rims a couple of times, and have used a torque wrench with an adaptor to fit the lugnut, and have not experienced any problems. everytime i think about the use of an impact wrench on my track rims, i just cringe.. again, sorry to hear about your story.

 

ouch.. that really sucks, man. sorry to hear about your car. hopefully you and that guy can work something out when you get those fixed, or if he replaces them for you. i've adjusted the lugnuts on my track rims a couple of times, and have used a torque wrench with an adaptor to fit the lugnut, and have not experienced any problems. everytime i think about the use of an impact wrench on my track rims, i just cringe.. again, sorry to hear about your story. i am very nit-picky when it comes to my z. i can see every little detail, so i sympathize with you.

 

I did a similar thing with my locking nut key. The Nissan kits key has a toothed lip around the edge. I got mine slightly crooked on the nut, and I put a scratch around the inside of that lug hole.

I taped up the outside of the key so that it will not do this in the future, even if I'm not the one removing the wheels.

 

The dealer said they couldn't get me touchup paint for the rims so I called 1-800-NISSAN1. The girl there told me that as far as she knew the wheels are alloy & not painted! She tried to tell me I was wrong!

She's going to research it & get back to me.

 

I assure you that the wheels are definately painted

You probably can't get "touch up" paint however, I believe that they are powder-coated.

It's not very difficult to get wheels refinished, but obvoiusly you don't want to do it needlessly.

 

I wonder what the Rays would look like if I stripped them down to bare metal & then clear-coated them?

 

I don't have a lot of experience with powdercoat, but I agree. I cleaned the wheels up after the "incident" and it was definitely paint chipping off.

 

i assure everyone they arent poweder coated, powder coating is VERY durable and hard to chip off, its cheap nasty clear coat, i for one will be replacing my lugs with tuner lugs, as i would recommend brian do as well

 

Just to clarify, it's not JUST a clearcoat, it's a metallic silver paint (obvious from the pics above) probably with a clearcoat over it.

 

yes, silver painted wheels with clearcoat. I however have to disagree that noone used the impact socket on your rims, the insode of the sockets have a bunch of black paint chips from the black impact socket they used, it was very noticeable when i first looked at them. but agreed the rims should be more durable

 

the impact sockets they have/used are, i know this A) because i have the same set, and B, because i saw them using them on the wheels of the viper when they were putting the wheels back on. and if you looked at the sockets, they had been scuffed and the black "coating" was reomved all the way around the sockets

 

we had 3 sets of tools out for dyno use that day, impact set, a hand set, AND a special viper set.

impact set:
1/2" impact wrench
17mm impact sockets (1/2" drive)
19mm impact sockets (1/2" drive)
21mm impact sockets (1/2" drive)

hand set:
1/2" ratchet
17mm thin wall chrome sockets (1/2" drive)
19mm thin wall chrome sockets (1/2" drive)
21mm thin wall chrome sockets (1/2" drive)
3/8" torque wrench
3/8">1/2" adapter

viper set:
1/2" ratchet
19mm thin wall chrome sockets (3/8" drive)
1/2">3/8" adapter
3/8" hex bit (3/8" drive)
6" extension (3/8" drive)


we always use a hand set for:
a) cars that have over torqued lug nuts that need to be broken free because the impact wrench won't do it, and
b) for cars with small lug holes.

for majority of cars, we used the impact set, but for the silver 350, we used the hand set and did everything by hand under the supervision of the car's owner. at

also, for the viper, our impact sockets and 1/2" sockets are too big to go into the holes for the wheel adapters, so we had to use the viper set. the 6>5 lug adapters have very small holes and require a very thin wall socket to fit into them. this would be our 19mm thin wall 3/8" drive chrome socket. we used the same socket to take the wheels off and to remount them. there is no way for us to have used impact sockets on this vehicle either.

we are always very careful with all the cars we dyno'd and have never seen paint just flake off like that before. the top layer flaked off and the primer was still on.

also, the factory lug wrench, which is silverish in color, also leaves black scuff marks on the finish, which i don't believe to be clear coated.

here are the sockets in question. i just took these pix.



those are front and back pictures of the 17, 19, and 21. the 17 and the 19 have seen more action, and their "black finish" is at most, scuffed. no rings, chipping, etc, etc.

 

1) I do not want to get into a pissing contest with the owners/employees/defenders of EuroSpeed Performance about this. Although I think they could have done better, I cannot argue with the assertion that wheels really need to be more substantial than this. Frankly, I have never heard of painted alloy wheels, I have never seen them before; the whole concept seems stupid to me. My V6 Accord has alloy wheels, they aren't painted.

2) It was stated to me by a friend who was there and observing for me that the impact wrench was used to loosen the lugnuts, not to tighten them. I believe this to be true, although I am not certain. I seem to remember this myself but it didn't concern me at the time; I was mainly concerned with stripped threads, so lugnut removal with impact wrench seemed inconsequential. It never occurred to me that alloy wheels could be damaged in this way.

3) I specifically remember seeing Alex having trouble with a tight fit, having to work a black (NOT chrome) socket into the lug hole. Again, I didn't know the wheels were painted, it never occurred to me that there might be damage. Should he, with his experience, have known? Possibly.

4) There were definitely black "rub-off" deposits in the lugholes left by the sockets (you can see a little bit of it in the pictures). Soap would not would remove it, acetone & Q-tips got it off.

5) When I showed it to him, Alex was concerned and willing to work with me. I'm not as mad at EuroSpeed Performance as I am at Nissan. If I had it to do over again I would have done the lugwork myself, but given the circumstances I might have done some of the same damage. I think I would have been paying better attention and caught it quicker though, and not scarred every lughole on both wheels.

 

i'm just trying to state my case, and don't wish to get into a pissing contest either.

we never used any impact wrench on your car, neither to loosen or to tighten the lug nuts. you told us you did not want to use the impact, and we didn't.

i'm always very careful about the cars i work with, any of my customers will tell you that. and i am very sorry that the finish on your wheels was damaged during the dyno setup.

we always do our best to make sure everything is done right, by not hitting the rev limiters, hand torquing all the wheels, etc, etc.

please let me know how it turns out with finding the touch-up paint and if there is anything i can do.

thanks.

 

Thank you for your concern. The true measure of a service business is how they respond when things go wrong. I'll keep you posted.

 

Santa Clara, CA
350Z Chrome Silver, Track

Same thing happend to me too.

I had a flat and had Wheelworks patch up the tire.
I told them to take extra extra caution not to strip near lugs, as I've seen this happening to my friend's G35. However, its stripped just like the picture above. Oh well...what can you do? Atleast it isn't too noticeable.