Date:         Thu, 12 Aug 2004 12:27:28 -0700
Reply-To:     "phlogiston@ispwest.com" <phlogiston@ISPWEST.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         "phlogiston@ispwest.com" <phlogiston@ISPWEST.COM>
Subject:      more (interesting) questions about rhein rims
Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1

so i finished mounting and balancing my agilis tires on my shiny new rhein rims last night and went home to install them... (btw, i used all adhesive balanced weights and it seemed to work ok; i was able to get all the wheels to a point where if i took them off the balancer, rotated 180deg and re-balanced, the upper weight would come out as 0 and the lower less than 10 or 15 grams).  the front ones went on fine, although the lug bolts that i got from cafe volks had a lot of scale and pitting on the finish, not at all like the shiny chrome on the lug nuts for the back.

which brings me to my question:  do most of you running these wheels use the stock lug studs in the rear?  because some of the nuts only went on like 3 or 4 turns, including when i put the car back down and torqued them.  most of the nuts went on about 5 or 6 turns, but there was 1 or 2 on each wheel that didn't.  is this consistent with what other people have seens when installing these wheels?  is it enough?  where can i get new longer lug studs?


also, what torque are you guys using on these wheels.  i didn't want to over tighten and damage the aluminum, so i went to 65 ft lbs all around... but then later i remembered that i used to tighten the magnesium lug nuts onto the alloy rims of a past car to 90 ft lbs.

in conclusion these rims look great!  they have a weird 3d bulbous kind of look that doesn't look at all modern but goes great with the van.  i only wish the front lug bolts were shiny, too.

thanks for any advice...

Ben.