Interesting custom wheel thread

[Mito Man]

A lot of the things we buy in the UK are the same AliBaba based stuff but sold at 4x the cost with a warranty thrown in and convenience of 2 day delivery - the profit margin is so much that even if they give out a replacement part after a few months the UK reseller is still making a decent profit.
With Alibaba or Aliexpress that’s the risk you take although even if the item you buy is defective you’re usually still better off just buying another although I’ve found sellers to be quite helpful.

That factory might be the same one which supply Kahn Design but I don’t know if they then take further steps to actually get them tested and certified to EU standards.

[integrale_evo]

Exactly that.

I needed a screen for a dab display, I found them in the uk for £50, the exact same items on Ali express were £7

Most resellers just add enough extra in to cover them if they get the occasional defective unit. Buy them yourself at the cheap rate and you’re taking the punt yourself.

[Mito Man]

Same for the X5 boot actuators, the UK based eBay company was selling them at 2.5 times the cost but with a 2 year warranty. Even had the exact same sticker as the Ali Express part so it was the exact same part.

There's one particular website which is a big EV only supplier who are absolute twats in terms of customer service, but I digress, eventually I figured out that they just source their entire stock from Ali Express and repurchased everything at 1/3 of the cost. The hilarious bit is the 'About us' section on the website "Two friends in the Netherlands, an electrical engineer and an industrial designer, identified this problem when they were looking for accessories for their first Tesla cars. As professionals who are very much into technology and design in general and electric cars in particular, they found this niche and wanted to fill it."
The only thing they designed and engineered was the website.

[Sundayjumper]

A lot of the things we buy in the UK are the same AliBaba based stuff but sold at 4x the cost with a warranty thrown in and convenience of 2 day delivery - the profit margin is so much that even if they give out a replacement part after a few months the UK reseller is still making a decent profit.

I remember aaaaaages ago on the E36 forum, when CCFL halo eyes were a thing, one of the guys was doing exactly this, they kept failing but people thought he was awesome for sending them replacements.

[Sundayjumper]

And just to be “that guy” - what’s the insurance implications if one of these wheels causes an accident ?

[Rich B]

Boot actuators and LED screens aren't typically going to kill you if they fail!

[Beany]

It's not about China, or supply chains - that's well known - it's about presenting yourself as something you're not.


Their image:


Two minutes of reverse image searching later, oh, Whoops



Remind me again how fast you need to be going for a boot strut or a head unit replacement to kill you?

[Jobbo]

And just to be “that guy” - what’s the insurance implications if one of these wheels causes an accident ?

[Sundayjumper]

I'd forgotten your little tizzy about security wheel bolts ! That was funny

It was a genuine question here. The wheels presumably have no testing behind them and given the company is happy to photoshop somebody else's show stand to suggest it's theirs it makes you wonder what else they might be airbrushing from their business. I was going to say it's only one step up from making them yourself but at least if you made them yourself you'd know what went into them.

Unlike declined insurance claims over non-OEM wheel bolts there's plenty of evidence online of cheap Chinese wheels failing, e.g. here & here taken from this article on replica wheels.

And a side question - isn't it massively wasteful to make wheels from billet ? I know the cuttings can be recycled but that's a process that uses a lot of energy and you only end up with recycled aluminium, not new virgin material. Maybe they melt down the scraps to make new billets for the next set of wheels. That's even worse.

[Ascender]

And just to be “that guy” - what’s the insurance implications if one of these wheels causes an accident ?

That's kind of what I was wondering when I raised the question...

But yes, absolutely aware of the re-badging and price increases which happen across the board on all sorts of items which are all mass produced somewhere like China.

[Mito Man]

I remember that modified overlander Land Rover Discovery which had a wheel fall off, then the wheel killed a little girl. Just looking to see what came of it and apparently nothing.
https://www.lincolnshirelive.co.uk/news ... ore-target
Even says the part wasn’t original.
Either the wheel/spacer failed or someone didn’t torque it all correctly, seems pretty simple to figure out.

[Ascender]

... Land Rover Discovery which had a wheel fall off, then the wheel killed a little girl.

Keep it light Mito!

[Jobbo]

Unlike declined insurance claims over non-OEM wheel bolts

I think you might have missed the fact that it was declined claims for stolen alloys, which seems pretty obvious - I wondered why you got your knickers in a twist at the time

Fair enough querying the quality of these alloys, but referring to insurance claims is a bit of a leap - people have been putting cheap Chinese alloys on their cars for decades.

[V8Granite]

I bought a Bluetooth module to replace the cd changer in the TT, worked fine for a week and then nearly set the car on fire as I could smell burning.

It’s a problem with so much stuff, even Lemforder parts are being made in China which is fine, if a quality control structure is there but as everyone wants cheap it’s not just the quality of the parts which is messed with.

Either way buying quality in any aftermarket situation can be a minefield, even Brembo quality has fallen massively.

Dave!