Hi,
I'm _weeks_ behind on this list, but if your experience is/was anything
like mine, you will appreciate _any_ comments about wheels.
I purchased 3 American Racing 4-spoke aluminium wheels for my TR in 1994
for really cheap money. The rational was that it should be relatively
easy to come up with a 4th wheel.
Over the next two years, I think I might have actually found every other
owner on the East Coast with less than four of the same wheels (slight
exaggeration). I did make many calls, I did actually hold other wheels
that were like mine in my hands.
What I found was that folks really overestimated the value of what they
had, and thus it was impossible to make a purchase agreement with these
folks. They were very inflexible.
Also, I found that once these people figured out that other folks were
looking to complete a set by obtaining one or two rims that there must be
more out there, so they decided to keep what they had and try to complete
thier sets. This happened to two different owners that I contacted.
I believe the wheels that you are looking for are the 8 spoke style
"mini-lite" wheel. I have seen several sets of these at various swap
meets, but they were not cheap. In fact, in my opinion, they were priced
at outrageous levels, one guy wanted $1000 for four, and they were not
perfect by any stretch of imagination.
My advice is this: buy a set of new wheels. Get Panasports in the
charcoal-grey finish and imagine that they are the old Mag wheels. The
reason is simple: the new wheels are better than the old ones. They are
less likely to fail due to fatigue etc, and they are built with better
alloys. If you are nuerotic about weight, get the Panasport "ultra-lite"
wheels, but don't drive them on the street, they are not D.O.T. approved!
The second reason is that the new Panasports will coss the same or less
than a set of real magnesium orignal minilites or the old AMerican racing
wheels _if you can find them_. I can rant ad nauseum on this topic, so if
you wish to continue the conversation, drop me line.
regards,
rml
p.s. if you find an American Racing 4-spoke, please get in touch with me ;-)
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Quote: How many American Racing Mags do you own? 4, 3 5.5x15 and 1 6.0X15.
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