Cool Look, But Good Idea?

[tian647]

Saw these special wheels on C/L: https://kansascity.craigslist.org/mp...451303325.html
00V0V_7UGDE9rtPYNz_0CI0t2_600x450.jpg

They do offer a pretty interesting aesthetic, but would you trust riding on them?

[ParcNHawk]

For fitting to a Hawk?
Or drilling holes in rims?

[tian647]

For fitting to a Hawk?
Or drilling holes in rims?

Might fit a Hawk but I don't think I'd want a skinny 18" -- I was asking about drilling holes through the middle of the spokes.

[6]

Easy answer. How comfortable are you if your front wheel explodes? Not being sarcastic, for real. On anything I'm going to ride hard, no. For something I cruise down to a bike night, park, ride 30mph home on pothole less roads. Ok.

Light wheels are expensive for a reason. Honda designed them with that much metal for a reason. Our wheels are cast.. they will shatter if you break them.

It's iffy.

That aside, I'm not sure the hawk wheels will look as good as those with the holes.

[harpo]

Saw these special wheels on C/L: https://kansascity.craigslist.org/mp...451303325.html
00V0V_7UGDE9rtPYNz_0CI0t2_600x450.jpg

They do offer a pretty interesting aesthetic, but would you trust riding on them?

I just read the CL post. Bad idea... these are OEM wheels that have been drilled out extensively. Those wheels were designed to handle all the typical loads a wheel would see, PLUS a Factor of Safety (F.S.). I highly doubt the person drilling all those holes know what the F.S. was/is. Who is to say that F.S. is now close to 1 (meaning its just strong enough to handle typical riding forces). Hit a particularly large bump, or similar, and you get failure.

Along with that, drilling all the holes will increase the stress in the spokes. Stress = Force/Area , reduce the cross sectional area by drilling a hole and the stress (and strain) will go up. With that, one has to be concerned with cyclical loading causing the potential of fatigue cracking in aluminum due to increased stresses.

I know the old racers would drill standard bits out to lighten them up, but that's on the track with a bunch of other assumed risk of crashing is already high. For the street, this is crazy IMHO. Stay away would be my 0.02.

[riot]

I’m gonna take the opposing opinion:

Assuming that those holes were done in a workman like manner - with no jagged edges, and the holes not too close to the edge of any part, it would probably be ok.

• Those old Yamaha rims are brick sh*thouses. They are heavy and way overbuilt.
• Assuming you are only going bias ply XS650 speeds on them
• Most of the stress is carried in the outer edges of the part. See Section Modulus: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_modulus

I have had similar Yamaha rims though, and I would not buy these because they suck (not because they are dangerous). Spoked wheels of this vintage were far better because of the significantly lower weight. No way those holes reduced the weight significantly.

[Captain 80s]

Easy answer. How comfortable are you if your front wheel explodes? Not being sarcastic, for real. On anything I'm going to ride hard, no. For something I cruise down to a bike night, park, ride 30mph home on pothole less roads. Ok.

Light wheels are expensive for a reason. Honda designed them with that much metal for a reason. Our wheels are cast.. they will shatter if you break them.

It's iffy.

That aside, I'm not sure the hawk wheels will look as good as those with the holes.

Don't know how uncomfortable I am with those holes. Good pattern, seems well done, all in ribs or extraneous webbing. That type of wheel is probably the safest to do something like that with. I'd probably be fine riding on them, but I'm not gonna jump curb after curb or land a wheel-stopped-spinning 3 gear wheelie with them either. But I suspect the bike these wheels are going on would not entice me into, or be capable of, those scenarios.

But sorry everybody... I don't think stock Hawk wheels can look worse than the way they came.

[6]

don't think stock Hawk wheels can look worse than the way they came.

hahahah