Miata wheels on a Honda?

In reply to AngryCorvair:

Actually, CRX's are hub-centric.

bravenrace wrote: In reply to AngryCorvair: Actually, CRX's are hub-centric.

Are the lug nuts flat or are they angled / acorned? Yes, acorned. Thus, lug-centric.

Not so. All of my Escorts and Jeep Liberty plus ny 2011 Fiesta have hub centric wheels and 60 degree lug nuts.

Honda's may be hub centric, but all my aftermarket wheels for the CRX aren't fitted for Honda's ... so they end up being lug centric .. I just have to be careful when seating the lugs so that the rims get centered on the hub

In reply to wbjones:

Hub and lug centric refers to how the wheels are manufactured. Once they are produced one way they are that way forever. I understand what you are saying, but if the hub is used as the datum point for making the wheel, that never changes. That said, I don't doubt it works for you. I've done it myself.

DILYSI Dave wrote:

bravenrace wrote: In reply to AngryCorvair: Actually, CRX's are hub-centric.

Are the lug nuts flat or are they angled / acorned? Yes, acorned. Thus, lug-centric.

In the truck industry, where I come from, hub centric wheels have a center bore that fits tight on the hub and the lug nuts are straight. Lug-centric wheels have a center hole that has clearance to the hub and have conical lug nuts. So normally I'd agree with you. But CRX's are in fact hub centric. I know this not only because the center hole is tight on the hub (tightening the lug nuts, tapered/conical or not will not change how concentric the wheel is with the hub), but years ago I asked someone I know that works for Honda because it didn't make sense to me either. The answer was what I just wrote. Its also why aftermarket wheels that aren't made specifically for Honda's come with hub-centric rings.

CRXs make great ice racers.

bravenrace wrote: In reply to wbjones: Hub and lug centric refers to how the wheels are manufactured. Once they are produced one way they are that way forever. I understand what you are saying, but if the hub is used as the datum point for making the wheel, that never changes. That said, I don't doubt it works for you. I've done it myself.

you're right ... what I was meaning was that the wheel gets centered ( in my case) by the lugs not the hub ... when I'm replacing the wheels on the Integra ( after a brake job, etc... ) I don't have to be careful ( or at least as careful) when I tightening the lug nuts, as the wheel will sorta center itself, due to the hub being the centering device for the OEM rim...

the race rims on the CRX on the other hand. I have to make sure they seat exactly in the holes in the rims, sorta wiggle themselves into place so that the wheel is centered and won't cause vibrations on the track ...

bravenrace wrote:

DILYSI Dave wrote:

bravenrace wrote: In reply to AngryCorvair: Actually, CRX's are hub-centric.

Are the lug nuts flat or are they angled / acorned? Yes, acorned. Thus, lug-centric.

In the truck industry, where I come from, hub centric wheels have a center bore that fits tight on the hub and the lug nuts are straight. Lug-centric wheels have a center hole that has clearance to the hub and have conical lug nuts. So normally I'd agree with you. But CRX's are in fact hub centric. I know this not only because the center hole is tight on the hub (tightening the lug nuts, tapered/conical or not will not change how concentric the wheel is with the hub), but years ago I asked someone I know that works for Honda because it didn't make sense to me either. The answer was what I just wrote. Its also why aftermarket wheels that aren't made specifically for Honda's come with hub-centric rings.

did i miss when CRX's became trucks? and this becomes an overloaded-CRX photo thread in 3...2...1...

bravenrace wrote:

DILYSI Dave wrote:

bravenrace wrote: In reply to AngryCorvair: Actually, CRX's are hub-centric.

Are the lug nuts flat or are they angled / acorned? Yes, acorned. Thus, lug-centric.

In the truck industry, where I come from, hub centric wheels have a center bore that fits tight on the hub and the lug nuts are straight. Lug-centric wheels have a center hole that has clearance to the hub and have conical lug nuts. So normally I'd agree with you. But CRX's are in fact hub centric. I know this not only because the center hole is tight on the hub (tightening the lug nuts, tapered/conical or not will not change how concentric the wheel is with the hub), but years ago I asked someone I know that works for Honda because it didn't make sense to me either. The answer was what I just wrote. Its also why aftermarket wheels that aren't made specifically for Honda's come with hub-centric rings.

and if you use those plastic hub centric rings on a car that's a-x'ed or tracked, you'll more than likely crash ... the rings will melt due to the heat generated by the brakes, and leave the rim loose on the hub ... let's not go into how I know this ... what I will say is that I didn't do any damage to the car while learning this ...

aluminum or steel rings would be ok .... though the only time I've ever seen those is if I've ordered them specifically ... never have I had them come with aftermarket rims

In reply to wbjones:

I used the same set of four plastic rings (from Discount Tire) for 8 years of racing on my ITB VW GTI, and they never melted. Like anything else , quality and your experience may vary.

Again, not true. at least in my case. Ran wheels with plastic rings for many track days etc. They never melted nor did I ever crash.

Besides, properly tigtend lug nuts/bolts will hold the wheel in place.

mine did ... on a 35 sec a-x course ( 5 runs ... ~ 20 cars/per run group)

after the last run, when I went to swap out the R-comps and put on the stock rims .. all the lugs were loose ( that's when I figured out that you re-tighten the lugs after each run ) ... actually they were finger "tight" only and the plastic rings had to be scraped off with a knife ... totally squished/melted ( and yes they were torqued correctly to start with)...

since then I've never used rings ( other than some metal ones for a while) I've just made sure that the rims seated squarely on the lugs/holes in the rims and have never had a problem since ... actually I've never had loose lug nuts after a run either

In reply to wbjones:

While I've never melted plastic rings, I have found them to distort, which kind of defeats the purpose of them. So I only use aluminum or steel.
I'm having a hard time seeing how melted plastic rings would have any effect at all on properly torqued lug nuts.

bravenrace wrote: I'm having a hard time seeing how melted plastic rings would have any effect at all on properly torqued lug nuts.

^This.

bravenrace wrote: In reply to wbjones: While I've never melted plastic rings, I have found them to distort, which kind of defeats the purpose of them. So I only use aluminum or steel. I'm having a hard time seeing how melted plastic rings would have any effect at all on properly torqued lug nuts.

when they melted/deformed they flattened out ... a lot ... that left the lug nuts no longer snugged to the wheel .... therefore leaving loose wheels ... like I said it went from properly torqued ( 80#) to finger loose ... I'm guessing on the last run ..

sorta hard to describe ... their shape was round (of course) to fit the hub but there was a flange the extended out from the hub ( 1/2 to 3/4" and about 1/4 - 3/8 thick) all the way around ... this was the part that melted so then there was a void between the back of the rim and face of the hub ...

But the plastic ring should absolutely not be between the face of the hub and the back of the rim - it should be for locating only, and would not see any load from the torquing of the bolts. The wheel should be against the hub - with or without the hub-centric plastic ring. There was something else going on.

In reply to wbjones:

Well that was a bad design. I've never seen any like that. They usually extend out from the center hole a short distance, but the wheel also has a chamfer to clear them.
Were these rings made for the wheels you used them on? I'd never put plastic between the wheel and the hub. That sounds like a misapplication to me.

I know that now...

yeah, they came with the rims, and I've never put plastic between the wheel and hub since ... keep in mind, this was very early on in my "racing" career ... can't remember the name of the co. they were out of Fla and were the prime sorce for Falken Azenis ( the 215) back in the day ... went under during the crash of '08, I think.. (I'm sure there are folk on this forum that can come up with the name) the rims were Rota Slipstream copy's

I bought a couple of sets of rims from them, and both came with the same hard plastic centering rings ... needless to say I didn't use the second set

Re melting plastic rings:
It depends on WHICH plastic is used.

If your wheel is matched to the hub diameter (with or without the use of rings), it's essentially a hubcentric wheel. But you can run without them if you have conical or spherical lug nuts. I've done it both ways on the same car without any ill effects. If you tighten up the lug nuts like your daddy told you - in a cross pattern - the wheel should seat just fine. It's one of those things that gets people all wound up but without any real reason.

I've seen centering rings melt on track, but I've never seen one that was an integral part of mounting the wheel.

What some people don't know is that the terms hub and lug centric don't just relate to the fitting of the wheel on the car, but also do how they were made in the first place. To illustrate, imagine you are going to machine the outside diameter of a wheel (yeah, I know, just roll with it). Since you want it to run true, you have to reference something in order to make sure it's concentric. So you mount it to a lathe to do this. If you mount it by the lug holes to machine the OD, then you are making it lug-centric. Since this is the reference datum, the holes will be tapered to make sure the lug nut is centered with the hole. If you chuck that wheel up by the center hole and then machine the OD, then it's hub-centric. In this case the center hole is designed to fit tight on the hub to remove all slop, and the lug holes effectively don't matter as far as centering goes. Technically the lug holes should be straight and allow for a small amount of slop between the lug nut and the hole (because the hub does the centering), but they are sometimes tapered anyway, which has very little effect good or bad. A centering ring sometimes helps with installing a lug centric wheel on a hub-centric car, but not always. Likewise, not using them sometimes works fine and sometimes doesn't. In addition, a wheel that has a center hole that is larger than the car it is going on isn't necessarily a lug-centric wheel. In the case of a Honda with aftermarket wheels, the hole in the center is almost always larger than the hub diameter, but this is done so that the wheel fits more than one application. The wheel itself could have been designed and manufactured lug or hub centric. The same goes for the hub. It can be made lug or hub centric. The bottom line is that something has to be used as a reference for concentricity when making a wheel or a hub, and some are made each way. I have some older, very expensive wheels that are made specifically for Honda's and the center hole is the same size as OEM. I also have a set of Rota wheels that have a larger center hole to fit other vehicles. If I run them without centering rings I get a vibration. With them it is still there but is significantly less.
In other cases the car may run fine without any rings, but it's really a crap shoot because of manufacturing methods and varying tolerances.

nice to know the technical side ... as for the vibration of the Rota wheels on a Honda ( they're one of the sets I run, for highway, a-x, and track) if I'm careful as I tighten the lug nuts, going back and forth on all 4, I can feel the wheel aligning itself correctly, and I end up with zero vibration ... if I'm careless and tighten one all the way without regard to whether it's centered in the hole then there's a very good chance that there will be some vibration ( sometimes even severe vibration )

so, yes you've made your point about the difference between hub and lug centric rims ..... but most of us are't machinists, so we end up using the words incorrectly even thought we know what we mean even if we don't know what we're talking about

wbjones wrote: I bought a couple of sets of rims from them, and both came with the same hard plastic centering rings ... needless to say I didn't use the second set

if the wheels were new, and you didn't dremel or otherwise remove the paint (or powdercoat) from the lug seats, that's why your lug nuts loosened up. the paint (or powdercoat) deforms from the pressure of the lug nut against it, and the stretch of the lug (which we don't measure directly, but we can figure out indirectly by knowing the torque on the nut, the angle of the thread, and the material properties of the stud) decreases. less stretch = less clamp force, and it can lead to lost lug nuts, broken wheel studs, etc. i know this because it sidelined our ChumpCar at Road America in April 2012, when we were running 5th with 25 minutes to go. :-(

could be .... hasn't be a problem since ... but I've not had actually new rims ( always used ) since then ... I've a brand new set ( still in their boxes ) waiting for the new star specs to come out ... I'll make sure to clean out the holes before use

thanks