Hello,
My name is Wade Huisman. I am the Sales & Tech Rep. with Keizer Racing Wheels. Just would like to add a few comments to this post made in the past years.
Keizer Wheels builds for 1,000 applications across the world. It is a constant balancing act providing the lightest, which is requested, & the strongest which is also requested. Providing customers with the lightest wheel available on the market often comes with trials when we are racing them on the weekends. No one fields those trials better then us. These wheels are of the lightest nature & do not take kindly to mishandling nor misrepresentation of its application. At times the custom specs provided may not give longevity to a customers represented application. This, ultimately is to their discretion. Unfortunetly, not every racer is a engineer & it's hard for us to think for them.
Every wheel is leak tested when they leave our facility. If you encounter a leaky wheel, Once or even twice. I would suggest stop putting the tire spoon or screw driver through the silicon based seal. Or you need to maintenance the wheel. That will most definitely solve your problem. This is the nature of any 3pc wheel in this weight catogory. Do not damage the seal & you won't have a problem. Bottom line, this wheel will require care & attention at some point in time in its lifespan. This is inevidable.
Keizer wheels should be inspected often. These wheels are not meant to last forever. They will fatigue & will give out in there racing career. How long are your tires good for? Just like your tires, you may need to replace certain pieces of these wheels at times. This is the reality of going fast. If you want a wheel that last for decades, buy something else. If you want a wheel that provides maximum HP & handling, give us a try. Inspection of the wheels will often indicate a problem before you end up on the sidelines. It does not happen all @ once on the 4th lap. If you can not use simple hand tools to tighten or loosen hardware in a wheel this may not be the piece for you. Every wheel has a 15 bolt modular pattern that allows you to replace a component if & when it is needed.
This year we have recently set new Track records for many classes. Below is a picture of a BMW. 15" wheel applications can easily support up to 3000lb cars, if the application is represented in full. Again, these wheels are not meant to last forever, sometimes you may insure hurdles as with any race upgrade. But the benefits can well overpower any doubts & trials. You can not spend what you do on a set of race wheels & get that kind of HP result anywhere else on the car. One pound of rotational mass is equal to 70 pounds in car weight. On average a set of Keizer Wheels can save a racer 32-48 pounds of rotational mass. This is a huge advantage.
Now, with all this said, I hope I did not scare any champions away. These wheels work great for a lot of racers that understand what it takes. They also last for a long time without incident for many racers. The above statement is correct and Real Wheels and others do offer a "beefier wheel", if that is what you are looking for. If anyone has any concerns or questions please feel free to contact us. We are open and honest about what our wheels bring to the table.
Below is a further explanation on the benefits of lightweight wheels and exactly why we are in business.
Wade Husiman
Huisman Racing Ent.
Keizer Racing Wheels inc.
712-737-3053
kaw@mtcnet.net
www.keizerwheels.com
To the Engineer
The amount of wheel mass is a critical factor when selecting a wheel to use. The selection of a set of wheels with the minimal amount of mass possible is of the utmost importance. Wheel selection is a central part of building any performance machine because it affects such characteristics as acceleration, deceleration “braking”, and handling of the vehicle. In the following sections of this report you will see exactly how mass drives all these factors mentioned above.
Newton’s second law will be the basis for the explanation of how this mass affects acceleration. This law states that force equals mass times acceleration, force is also proportional to mass, and there is also a rotational equivalent for mass: the moment of inertia, I, which represents an object’s resistance to being rotated. Using the three rotational variables, we can arrive at a rotational equivalent for Newton’s Second Law: Torque (T) equals moment of inertia (I) multiplied by rotational acceleration (α). This equation can be rewritten to state that:
α = T/I
From the equation above, note that the acceleration is inversely proportional to the moment of inertia. This means that the lower the moment of inertia the higher the value of acceleration will be. Also, because deceleration “breaking” is acceleration in the opposite direction the equation shows how stopping power is affected by this same equation. From this equation we can see that the lower the moment of inertia the better.
Now that we understand how critical the moment of inertia is of a wheel, let’s look at how the moment of inertia relates to mass. Mass is a property of a physical object that quantifies the amount of matter it contains. However, what we are interested in is the dynamic affects of mass which relates to the moment of inertia of that object. For objects made up of many particles, the moment of inertia is the sum of all the moments of inertia for the individual particles. Real objects are indeed made up of many particles, so many which treating them individually is a daunting task. Engineers have figured out methods to determine this inertia value. There are three common ways in which they measure this moment of inertia. Mathematically summing up this inertia value can be accomplished through integral calculus or by using the equations below. Solid modeling may also be used if a three dimensional electric copy is available. Or if the object is not too large, it is possible to measure the moment of inertia by applying a known torque and measuring the angular acceleration. For certain very simple objects we may determine the moment of inertia by reasoning alone, based on the m*r2 moment of a single particle I = M * R2.. This is the real challenge involved in the rotational version of Newton’s Second Law, which is sorting out the correct value for the moment of inertia.
For our purposes, let’s assume that a wheel is 75 percent ring and 25 percent disk. Using the two equations shown below it would be possible to find an approximant value for what a specific wheel might be.
Mass of a wheel also affects the handling of a vehicle in the affect of unstrung weight. Unsprung weight is any weight that is not supported by the springs on a vehicle. In such a dynamic event this mass is free to move up and down the changes in the roads surface. Because the wheels are part of this unsprung weight we will look at how this mass affects the vehicle. This mass is related to kinetic energy needed to keep the wheel gripping the surface. The more energy that is needed the harder it will be for the suspension to maintain traction with the surface in question. Below is the equation for this relationship.
Ki=1/2*W2*Mi*Ri2
K= Kinetic Energy
W = angular speed
Mi= mass
Ri = radius from the axis
From this relationship we see that the less the mass of the wheel, less energy is required to control it. In this case the wheel is part of the unsprung weight and unsprung weight is the weight under the springs which moves up and down as the vehicles hides over uneven roads and leans in the corners. For example, this is important because, the greater the unsprung mass the harder the suspension components have to work when a wheel hits an irregularity in the road. The more mass in a tire the greater the kinetic energy is created when it hits an irregularity in the road. Both raised sections and bumps reduce the tires ability to have full possible contact pressure when these vertical accelerations are experienced. This is how handling is affected by the mass of a wheel, the lighter the wheel the more effective contact the tires will have with the road because it takes less energy to keep it in contact with the roads surface at all times.
In conclusion inertial mass is a measure of an object's resistance to changing its state of motion when a force is applied. An object with small inertial mass changes its motion more readily, and an object with large inertial mass does so less readily. Also, because mass is a function of Inertia it also affects the vehicles handling. From this information one would want to select the lowest weight wheels possible.
To the Weekend Warrior
A good rule of thumb is to use a wheel that is as light as possible without sacrificing strength and only increase the diameter if extra disc brake clearance is needed. The universal understanding that heavier is slower works well for this situation. There is always performance to gain when weight is lost and the part does not break. All too often people forget this when selecting a wheel; sadly, there are people who pick their performance wheels on looks alone. Sometimes these new wheels end up weighing many more pounds than their factory wheels. It is an understandable mistake when one is not properly educated on this subject. For the logic that, “what is a few more pounds my car already weights 3,000 pounds” is an easy misconception to make if there is no background in this subject. However, a few more pounds of weight per wheel is no trivial matter for each wheel is part of the drive line of the vehicle and is also part of the vehicles unsprung weight. Let’s now relate how this extra weight really affects the performance of the vehicle. Imagine a bicycle wheel and the “wheel of fortune” on The Price is Right. Which one do you think is easier to spin? The bicycle wheel is much lighter than the other and therefore takes less work to spin it. Think of how much faster you can get it to rotate. Although, this might not be as exciting as “The Price is Right wheel” you should see how much harder your vehicle also has to work when you are trying to put the power to the road with a heavier wheel. From this observation it is understandable that a heavier wheel is much harder to rotate than the lighter wheel and this weight affects many important aspects of performance in ones vehicle.
Now let’s look at how this weight also affects the handling of your vehicle. It is also important to not only accelerate your wheels, but to also keep them firmly planted on the road. For this reason it is also important for them to be as light as possible.
For example imagine this scenario,
- Place your arms our stretched perpendicular to your body and have someone place a bowling ball in your hands. In this case your arms represent the suspension arms and our muscles the springs. Imagine the bowling ball as the rim and tire combination.
- Now toss the bowling ball up into the air and catch it. Feel the amount of effort that it take to counter act it s weight.
- Next attempt this experiment with a tennis ball, throw it up into the air and feel how easy it is to stop.
Take note of the differences between the two situations. It was the one with less weight that was easier for you to control. The same goes for your vehicle, a lighter wheel in all situations will be easier for the suspension to control in any situation. The lighter wheel allows your suspension to better react to any bump of dip in the roads surface. This allows for more contact with the road.
Now you know how to make a good selection when purchasing a new set of rims. The next time you purchase a set of rims, Look for ones with a low amount of weight and do not make a selection on looks alone. For weight will greatly affect your performance of your vehicle in all conditions, acceleration, breaking, handling, and even gas mileage.