Yo,

I picked up 4 new steel wheels from discount tire a month ago. Since then I've had a shimmy/vibration at 60 mph. It drove me nuts. I got aligned, rebalanced etc and it wouldn't go away...

Finally, while trying another balance at discount tire they came out with their tail between their legs and told me I had two bent wheels. WTF? These wheels are one month old.

They gave me a great deal on four new aluminum wheels (wholesale, free mount etc) - which I'm putting on tomorrow - but could these have really bent in a month? Or are they covering up that they sold me defective wheels...?

 

You either hit something or they were just simply defective. That's kinda all there is to it

 

I guess the question is (I don't know much about it): Is steel really that malleable, or cheap? They claim they see bent steel wheels all of the time... but aluminum holds up for years of abuse. I just didn't know that. Plus a month seems ridiculous. And I didn't hit anything.

 

I good steel wheel is really tuff. Cheaper ones are really soft. Steal will bend were aluminum will crack or bust. I had a 04 SRT4 and warped one of my wheels just by hitting a bump. They were aluminum. It really just depends on the tire and how well you take care of them. Low pro tires will make a wheel more volnurable to bends

 

They're michelin ltx a/t tires... very high pro. Must've been cheap wheels. It was these in chrome:

http://www.discounttire.com/dtcs/fin...&rw=&rc=WASINT

I'm putting these on tomorrow:

http://aewheel.com/eagle_alloy_wheel...d=1947&cat=474

 

Those are some ugly steel wheels man. Looks like a regular spare rim. For 60.00 a piece you could have added a little and got a good set of soft eights

 

Actually, I think they looked pretty good. I'm going to miss them:

[IMG][/IMG]

 

Nice truck!

Those are chrome modulars on your truck, not like the wheel in the link. Yours are like these:

http://www.discounttire.com/dtcs/fin...0139&rc=WASINT


I've had a bent wheel (and it was a chrome mod!) that I kept trying to re-balance. They had been sitting in a field and had questionable history though. I've never actually bent a steel wheel, myself, but it obviously can happen.

If a tire is out-of-round, even if it's perfectly balanced, it'll wobble. A bent axle shaft is a possibility if it's from the back end. You can also try rotating the wheels around to trace the problematic one. Sometimes a slight wobble will almost disappear if the wheel is moved to the rear axle.

Aluminum wheels are harder than steel but less malleable. That means that they'll hold up to slight impacts without bending but if suspected to a severe impact, they can crack. Steel wheels are very difficult to crack--they just bend.