I'm thinking of a new set of wheels for the 68' Charger and I'm looking for one of the lightest wheels that I can find in the 275/40-17 size (front and rear). I curently have Centerline Telstars 245/50-16's in the front, and 275/40-17's in the back. They are lighter than stock but I want something even lighter....Thanks

Bump and Kinissis spelling? are light. Its a money vs weight strength thing.
I would check tire rack or google performance wheels. Good luck

Check tirerack.com, and pick up a cpoy of Grasroots Motorsports magazine for some performance-directed ad content. Tirerack sets up their ads to include weights, and there are custom wheel fabricators in the back of the magazine. Be prepared to spend some bucks for truly light wheels. The benefit/cost ratio for light wheels starts to drop pretty fast on 18+ inch wheels, and on 17" wheels less than 20#.

With any luck, this thread will be put in to a dedicated performance handling and suspension forum...

Clair

The problem with having light wheels with these sizes of tires is fragility and backspacing.
I'm using 19x9.5 rear wheels with 5.5 backspacing. 3-part Forgeline aluminum wheels. Rather light, though I chose them primarily for aesthetic reasons.

I use them for road racing, and I wouldn't go any lighter, because I know road racing and potholes will bend or break them one day. Wheels with that much BS are susceptible to this, especially with thin tires (275/35R19).

Some light wheels can even get damaged simply having the car sit on them.

Centerline has always made very light and strong wheels.

The problem now days is trying to get a light wheel in the 17" and larger diameters. The size of the hoop adds lots of weight as the diameters go up.

http://store.summitracing.com/egnsearch.asp?N=700+400056+115+4294923105

18" outers are not too heavy...I've got some soft lift ones here and they are not bad at all

3 piece wheels (higher end stuff) is another thing again of course..

The least expensive, high quality 17 inch rims are the ones that Ford Motorsports sells. Ford has the volume to bring high quality forged rims to market so you get a high quality rim that meets safety standards but doesn't cost much. Most aftermarket rims are junk until you get to the higher end of the market and those rims cost money.

If you can afford really good rims then give the guys at Fikse a call. If you can't afford Fikse rims then stick with something out of the Ford Motorsports catalog. There is only a couple of pounds difference but those last couple of pounds will cost you a few hundred bucks per rim.

Kiesler has those new rims built for our older cars that are Viper SRT replica's. Don't know about weight etc, but I do know that they are engineered for our E and B bodies.

Lots of rims out there. True, Fikse, Forgeline, HRE are all top stuff, but probably more $$ than may would want to spend. There are many other good wheels our there that are less money like Boze, Intro etc. Many 2 and three piece wheels to choose from. Look for aircraft hardware, 6061 hoops, etc.
As far as the Ford stuff goes, I think its all cast alum. I have been using the Chinese copies and have had zero troubles over the course of a couple years now.
Against the judgement of many on the board, I would stay away from 17s because the choices are limited. 18s offer the best selection of tires in the closest heights that fit the older cars, with an excellent selection of compounds.

realistically, I'd be looking at stiffness of a wheel more than weight.

If you're not made of money, and trying to be weight conscious on unsprung weight, I'd look at relative weights of tires more than wheels-- there can be a 5lb variance between different tire brands in the same size, and that weight is probably mainly in the tread, which is much further away from the neutral axis, increasing your moment of interia. higher MoI will require more power to accelerate.

Comparing a light wheel vs. a heavy wheel of the same diameter, I'd wager a large portion of the weight difference is in the spokes, not in the outer rim. this additional weight is much closer to the neutral axis, so it has a marginal impact on MoI. also, the heavier wheel will most likely be stiffer. a friend has seen "lightweight" wheels flex causing up to 1-2 degrees change in camber on cars with on-board telemetry in autocrossing. the camber change will probably have a greater (negative) impact on handling and consistency than the added unsprung weight.

I wish I could find it now...but there was an article I read online of a back to back test. A light wheel verses a stiff wheel. The light wheels were better in a straight line, but the stiff wheels were better around corners.
So, if you get stiff and light you're golden.

I had a set of Fikse rims made for my car but they were expensive. More than $3000 and that was 10 years ago, not sure what they cost these days. Nice thing about custom rims is that you can get the correct hub size, width, offset, etc. that you need. Only issue is coming up with the bucks to pay the bill.