My recent Style 87 rep wheels Purchase Experience

[chefwong]

I hope this may serve as a informative thread for those interested in Style #87 replica wheels.
There seems to be 2 types on Ebay --- same style, most likely different manufacture.

I had the recent displeasure on going through the hassles of both styles and wanted to list the pros/cons.
The true colors of a company shows during it's post sales customer service and both companies I dealt with
would get a recommendation from me any day. Remember, they are not the manufacture of the wheel, just resellers.
As with the power of the internet, it has allowed companies to be non-brick-mortar shops but the ability to drop ship items
from regional warehouses. Only so much QA can derive from this.

If you're really picky and expect the best out of replicas, I suggest you shop for OEM wheels in which
part of the price value you pay is the QC. Replicas are generally about 25% the cost of the same equivalent OEM style wheel.
The info below may shed where the 75% savings tradeoff is


On the smooth faced, non insignia Style 87 Wheels

Pros - Consistent Finish on the Entire Wheel --- however with contaminants.
Good packaging of wheels (metal is never touching the sides of the boxes).
There are 4 triangle cardboards in all 4 corners of the box keeping the wheels centered in the box.
Plenty of cardboard supports on the top and bottom to keep the entire wheel cushioned
as well.

Cons - Quality Control.
Lots of contaminants in the powdercoat. Some on the face being worse than others, but contaminants nonetheless.
Wheel damage. Out of the 6 wheels that were sent to me, 2 had a dinged lip, one having 3/16 chip missing on the top of the tire lip.


On the embossed face wheel, where there is BWM embossed on the face.

I don't have any Pros in comparison to the other wheel

Packaging was very poor. When I took delivery, it was 2 boxes within 1 large box.
However, when I lifted and put the box on the ground, I heard a metal clunk.
That was a indication of more to come.

While there is a rubber boot on the lip of the wheel, and felt sock on the face, there was little to no overall added cushioning for the wheel. Just the box itself and a extra piece of cardboard on the side of the face. The overall diameter of the wheel (metal) was touching all 4 sides of the box.

If you guys can just imagine any delivery route driver chucking boxes as to them, it's just a heavy box and another delivery, this is not a good way to pack a wheel from the factory for transit.


The paint finish is a painted finish ONLY on the face of the wheels. It is very not even at all . On the face it looks relatively uniform but if you were to look closer on the inner side where the face edge meets, you can see paint overrun. The clearcoat appears to be spray as well, and in my discussions with the ~distributor/seller~ they advise that the clearcoat is powdercoat. I disagree with their response to this fact. The paint stops where the front barrel drop is, and the remainder of the wheels appears to have a very cheap thin paint finish to them.

Different process on finishing, but the face showed similar contaminants in the finish as the other wheel.

Handling of the wheel *lips* showed but I am unsure whether this is from manufacturing or just because how it is packed. If you were to pay close attention to the edge of the lip, mini superficial dings can me found and some can be considered possibly 1/16" deep. I would call it moreso a pockmarked lip than a smooth edge.

This recent experiance Pales in comparison to my 1st replica purchase in which every aspect of the wheel was perfect.
YMMV, but I would be wary when purchasing any Style 87 replica wheel at this current time.

[Ambrosius]

I heard that the best replicas you can buy are from AFS.

[acitydweller]