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14" wire wheels

Jay Laifman

Donation Time
Wow just
I know it is a matter of taste but I can't stand all that air over the front tyres and it holds the road so well. No Chaffing or rubbing at all.

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As I've posted countless times, I similarly cringe at seeing that gap up front. I'm running a Series V front end with S3 springs on my S3, and like yours, it looks like it always should have. I'm certainly worried about Todd's loosening wheels and bad spinners. So I have a couple bad MGB wheels and bad Alpine wheels. I"m going to try to lace up an Alpine center to an MGB rim. MWS wants 500 pounds for it. Too much for my taste.

The problem is that the wires are basically rusted on. I've been trying all sorts of things to save them, without luck. I've noted that most shops say they just cut out the spokes and start over. Moss Motors wants about $6 per spoke ($360 for each wheel) - and those are actually MWS spokes. MWS sells spokes for less, but they are unbent and I'm not comfortable that I should be bending them.

Back to your car, just beautiful. I have to say I have seen only one Harrington in person. And I'm not a fan of the back end of the Le Mans versions. Yours looks just right. Of course, the angle is a bit extreme. I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt until you post other pictures or I see it in person. On my car, I made sure the bottom line of the door is horizontal to the ground and I think it works best at that rake.
 

todd reid

Gold Level Sponsor
That is great, and unfortunate, information.

What do you mean the threads o the spinner were gone? Do you think the threads failed because there were less being gripped? Or could it have been faulty even if you had Alpine wires on?

Yes, the threads on the spinner were totally wiped out. The spinner appeared to be made out of softer metal than hub, and yes I would attribute it to not enough threads being engaged since the spinners and hubs had been used with the Alpine wheels for many years and miles without incident.
 
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Jay Laifman

Donation Time
So from my point of view, Todd pretty much had the last word on this. I started this thread hoping for validation that the number of rotations on a stock set up was not actually required. Despite lots of beautiful cars running 14" wheels, I didn't feel that was proof enough.

Dan has mentions that MWS sells 14" wheels for Alpines. I spoke with them directly and they now deny that. They said they will build custom 14" wheels using the Alpine centers. But the price was ridiculous. I considered doing them myself, and got a bad Alpine wheel and bad 14" MGB rim to see about lacing them together. I decided that the exact angle of the bend in each spoke is crucial and I did not feel I could be sure of the right angle. So I dropped that idea as well.

I asked Dan in another thread to let us know how many rotations his spinner does to tighten to see if MWS actually sold him 14" wheels with the smaller hub. Otherwise, I'm sticking with 13" wheels.

I did see that 14" tire selection is not all that great either. 15" is better. But I think that is too little rubber for the car (looks wise).
 

Jay Laifman

Donation Time
Tim wrote on another thread:

Jay, You are correct that they do not sell the 14" wheels for an Alpine 'officially' as these are not a recognised combination, they will sell certain combinations as 'specials' provided that they have checked the suitability of the parts concerned for use in that combination. The hubs and wheels they supplied were a 'special' that they confirmed is fine for the car. The primary difference between the wheel centres is depth. The standard Alpine hub will give you 6 turns of the spinner to lock it up. The MGB wheel will lock up at just under 5 complete turns. This is not a problem and is more than enough, (it only becomes a problem if a centre lock wheel has less than three full turns) and remember that the wheel is spinning in such a way that it is tending to tighten itself all the time that you are driving.​
I called Jason Cox at MWS (UK 44 01753549360 jason@mwsint.com) today and confirmed this. Obviously the company only have confidence when they are supplying both the new hubs and the new wheels as they know that they will fit together correctly. I have no connection with the company and it makes no difference to me whether anyone uses them or not but they do know their stuff and the 14" wheels work well.​
Tim R​



Intersting. I get only 4 rotations with my Alpine. And I got an MGB wheel and put it on. I got only 2 rotations. Could there be different Alpine hub lengths? I have a SV rear end, with replacement hubs I bought at Sunbeam Specialties 20 years ago.

I also wonder if there are differences between MGB wire wheels. And the ones that MWS selects are actually narrower than the one I happened to find.

If I got 5 rotations with the MGB wheel, yes, I'd have no qualms about using them.
 
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Tim R

Silver Level Sponsor
Jay,

Our car is a Series IV fitted with brand new I-IV hubs. Our Series V has steel wheels so I can't comment on any variation with that type of hub.

I would advise you to speak (or E Mail Jason Cox) at MWS. He is extremely knowledgeable and helpful. When we were considering which wheels and tyres to fit there were a range of options including different diameters and widths that could be put together as a 'special'. He sent various technical diagrams to us showing where each combination would sit with regard to the standard Alpine fittings. Before he sold us the combination that we have he physically checked that what we had selected fitted together correctly and would work. I have included copies of a couple of the diagrams he sent to us below. (Note that they call their 5.5" x 14"wire wheel a 'Tiger wheel' even though Sunbeam Tigers did not have these).

Tim R
 

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Tim R

Silver Level Sponsor
Jay,
When I first saw those pictures I thought that there was nowhere near enough thread sticking through on the MG wheel but then I compared it to a photo that MWS sent to me where there does not look to be that much more thread visible. The key is how many full turns does the spinner go on?
On our car we get just under 5 full turns which is more than enough. I read somewhere that the Alpine spinner goes on 6 turns, now that I want to reference that I can't find where it was that I read it which is annoying!

Tim R

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GTolbert

Donation Time
Confirming TR6 72 spoke wheels fit exactly on sunbeam splines. 185/65R/15 tires with tubes. Nice common size.
 

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GTolbert

Donation Time
Built around Nov 13, 1967 she has the MkII trim. I like the rounded headlight rings. The Chrysler pentastar gets me Mopar muscle car crowd fun. If only it were a Tiger I could really mess with them.
 

alpine_64

Donation Time
Built around Nov 13, 1967 she has the MkII trim. I like the rounded headlight rings.
Well not exactly MKII tiger trim.. but does have the non peaked headlight rims

I think it looks better with the alpine grill bar and sharp grill eyebrow...the flat MKII tiger grill trim and egg crate grill don't do much for me personally...same goes for the sill and wheel arch trims they used.
 

Alpine 1789

SAOCA President
Diamond Level Sponsor
Built around Nov 13, 1967 she has the MkII trim. I like the rounded headlight rings. The Chrysler pentastar gets me Mopar muscle car crowd fun. If only it were a Tiger I could really mess with them.
That is just one week older than the car I parted out years ago. https://forum.sunbeamalpine.org/index.php?threads/how-far-gone-is-too-far-gone.5653/#post-32098 My car was far too gone to be saved, but it many of its best parts (headlight rings, much of its chrome, front valance) will go to my SIV project. Other parts are gracing other Alpines around the country, so it lives on in some fashion.

Confirming TR6 72 spoke wheels fit exactly on sunbeam splines. 185/65R/15 tires with tubes. Nice common size.
But, back to the original topic, that is a really interesting option. Jay's photo (below) of his hub with an MGB wheel was concerning. Does the TR6 wheel allow for more thread contact?

Here is my rear hub with my Alpine wheel and an MGB wheel.

View attachment 25678 View attachment 25679
 

Jay Laifman

Donation Time
I'm going to say my part again. I very much wanted to put on larger wheels - larger because more tire availability, larger because that was Howes' original design, and larger because I think they are cool. However, as much as I might pretend to be one, I am not a mechanical engineer. Car design goes through a lot of safety checks. Somewhere, somehow, someone has engineered what the correct margin of safety is for that one single nut holding on the wheel. I don't know what that is. I have never found it online. I have never heard anyone cite to it.

Instead, I have heard at least two people state that they themselves have had catastrophic failure of their spinner when putting 14" wheels on an Alpine (including on this thread). And I haven't heard of those failures for people with 13" wheels.

And I have shown to myself how there is an observable difference between the threads.

So despite my strong desire to go 14", I decided I personally am not going to take the risk. As Clint Eastwood said: how lucky do you feel?
 
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