Just got mine today from edge racing, no more shimmy at 50 mph.

 

Glad to hear it.

I never use my aftermarket wheels without hub rings installed.

 

Which ones did you get? Which ones should i get i have 18inch flik wasps...plastic ones are in now and would like metal....

 

Yup, had the same experience. CenterLine claimed their wheels were "lug-centric" but they were wrong. Got aluminum rings from Discount Tire online. Had to grind the face down a little to keep them from sticking out beyond the contact surface of the wheel, but they solved the high speed vibration problems.

 

Plastic tends to melt too.

 

Only under hard brake use.

 

I've melted front rings during lapping sessions.

The ring was so deformed it stuck to the hub and I could not easily remove them.

A big vice grip pliers could remove it, maybe.

I didn't have one so it was a battle to remove it and put on my stock wheels.

So it's metal rings for me when on the track.

During autocross the heat is not bad so plastic rings are fine.

Plastic rings are lighter and fine for street use as well. They are also easy to grind down to size if needed using a dremmel. Metal is a lot tougher.

 

I had the plastic ones that came with thte wheels. They looked fine when I took them out, but must be off just enough to cause a vibration.
Littlehandegan, call who ever you bought the wheels from and see if they sell metal rings.

 

Poor quality rings have been the root cause of more than one brake kit shimmy as well in over 14yrs of doing this stuff. Seen very few 'stud centric' wheels worth a darn. Only one I never had issue with was the oem SHO wheel where the kit had a lot of built in wheel spacer. Worked very well with no hub centering.

 

Not all wheel vendors sell the rings.

Make sure you have the right size to fit your wheel and the MINI hub bore 56.1mm

see Hub Centric Rings
http://www.1010tires.com/hubrings.asp
Plastic about $25 a set of four
Metal $35

Some wheel shops can measure and special order rings to be made about $30-35 in my local area and takes 3 weeks.

 

I'm NOT running hubrings with my Slipstreams (67mm hub), and am not having any issues with vibrations, etc... I first tighten the lugs while the car is suspended, and then lower it with the front tires just barely touching the ground (so as not to spin) for the final torque to spec pass. Do the hubrings serve any purpose beside just helping you get the wheel centered and make for an easier time mounting? Or am I at risk while hard cornering because there is no effective center hub to provide additional support? The guy I bought the wheels from regularly autocrossed his MCS without hubrings and without any issues...

 

centering rings are there to aid centering...

 

Isn't that kinda what I said.....................

 

Thanks for the peace of mind that I'll expeerience next time I'm going around a cloverleaf.

 

sure... just make sure your tire pressure is correct too.

 

But 15 psi on the passenger's side and 45 psi on the driver's side gives my car that trendy "gangsta lean"...

 

was thinking more of an oval staggered setup.. well, not with 15psi.

 

I've also found a light coating of antisieze helps when swapping out for the winter rims.

 

^^ that's good advise on the rings.

ive had plastic ones in the past where it snapped when i tried prying it off.. :impatient

 

I don't understand how centering rings can produce vibration unless there is a problem with the hub. The lug bolts are tapered so will center the wheel on each bolt hole without the need for the centering ring. I thought the centering ring was just to make it easier to get initial alignment with the bolts and the tightened bolts did the real work.

 

i have metal rings for my track wheels brcause i was worried about the mentling issue. i have since discovered that the fastest MINI w/ which i run (by far) has used plastic rings for many years. he as stoptec bbk and 235 whp. he knows how to use them both. no issues w/ plastic rings.

 

Do you mean "...can reduce vibration..." instead of "...can produce vibration..."?

CenterLine claimed their RPMs were lug-centric, but the reality was that they started vibrating if they didn't have centering rings. I had them balanced twice. Once before a 350 mile trip, but as the miles added up they started to vibrate. So I had them rebalanced at the destination. On the way home they started to vibrate again. Both shops had told me I needed rings. So, I got rings. No more vibration.

 

That is all they should do.

people are most probably not torquing the wheel down properly, or they are not torquing them which the wheels in the air. If you torque then on the ground then they will almost alwasy off center unless you have rings.

 

They were torqued to 103 lb-ft as specified for the R56. I watched Sullivan's Tire guys torque them in the air.

Further evidence that it wasn't an installation problem was that they were fine at the beginning of the trip, but vibration started and progressively got worse after about 200 miles. Same thing happened on the return trip after alignment was checked at Discount Tire in Los Angeles.

 

Also, although this doesn't sound like the problem in this case, you can also run into trouble if you insert the first lug bolt and tighten it all the way down to the final torque spec before you even get the other three bolts started.

I always put in all four bolts and tighten them until they're seated, and then tighten them all to 50% of the final torque value, then all four to 75%, then finally all four to 100%.