My girls 2012 lost an argument with a pot hole. Bent the rim bad enough that it went flat. If it was an old steel rim, I'd take a BFH and bend it back. How well will that work on an aluminum rim?

Also: how far can she actually drive on the fake spare while I hunt down another rim? The cute little thing in her trunk was a GoodYear and it says "conventional spare tire" even though it's clearly a space saver. Last time I dealt with one of those it said "for temporary use only". Have they switched to tires that are actually useable as spares?

I have seen an allow wheel mobil repair truck driving around in Harrisburg, but I do not recall the company name on it.

If you enter - pa aluminum wheel repair - into Google, you may find them or someone near you.

Discount tire can have it fixed for you. It isn't cheap but cheaper than a new wheel.

Straightened several with a block of wood to cushion the hammer but that was on the front side. Looks like it's the back side so I would give it a shot with just the hammer.
As far as the temp spare, I personally would drive as little as possible on it. Not trying to be a smart actor but there's a reason they say temporary and recommend low speed driving.


Tim

Like how cheap? I just found a bunch of used rims on Car-Part for about $100 /ea. Oddly enough can get new mopar from rockauto for $310 + shipping.

I think I'm gonna give it a couple wacks - doubt I could make it much worse. I wouldn't drive on those fake spares at all but the thing that threw me about this one is it doesn't say "temp use only" on it anywhere like they used to. Goodyear web site only said "it will get you to a tire shop".

I'm pretty sure the outfit your talking about is the one that usually has work lined up every week at the cluster of dealerships on the Carlisle pike. If it is, the owner is usually staged out back, behind the dealerships. I brought him a few bent alum rims, the one he said he could not fix looked similar to the one pictured.

Your 2 hours away, so I agree with TA, search your area first.

I would be looking at JY's for replacement personally. Bending aluminum that far back is just asking for a crack... maybe while you are running down the road.

Cost me $150 to straighten this BMW rim. This rim is not nearly as easy to find as yours. The tire cost more...

I once bent a steel 14" Rampage rim in a pot hole. Even though air only escaped from the bead I didn't trust the tire to not have internal damage...

I would try straightening that rim with a small (1/2 to 1 1/2 ton) bottle back inside the rim and try to push the bent part back where it belongs

Aluminum rims always crack for me when trying to straighten them, when they are bent.

So I asked google and apparently alloy rim repair is an actual thing and found a handful of shops in the area. Who knew? A few good shots with the BFH changed it from big freakin dent to a bit of curb rash. Aired it up but the bead is still leaking. I'm thinking a bit of bead sealer, if that's still a thing, should be all it needs. That and rebalanced as the glue on weights fell off while I was beating on it. Gonna go see what the corner tire shop says.

As for me, I'll take my old steel rims that bend pot holes.

Tire shop tried to sell me on 3rd party repair with like 3 day to a business week turn around. Also had no love for the bead sealer idea. Points for not trying to do a crap repair, deduct more points for trying to sell the expensive repair. It's a 2012 Chrysler 200 factory rim and they ain't exactly hard to find. Boneyard around the corner sold me one for $50 with the pressure sensor still on it.

As for the fake spare: I have an extra tire for the car from last time she lost an argument with a pothole and the yard has more rims. If a real tire will fit in the trunk....

My wife hit a chuck hole about 4 years ago in the winter with our 2001 300M & tire got destroyed, & alloy rim had a good dent in it - similar to the OP rim. I tried calling around to a couple of boneyards & nobody had one. Then I called a reputable tire shop - they said they have a company in Detroit that can repair them. $95.00 later & about 4 days, the bent rim looked perfect again. I was impressed - very impressed. Since then, I found one of these chrome alloy wheels in a boneyard & bought it for $20.00 just to have an extra. *I'll include it with the car to the new owner when it goes.

Save some time and just scrap it now, that’s a sure way to fubar the whole thing.


Aluminum Wheel repair is big business now with many shops in the big cities.

This is what I do.
All my drivers have a stock spare wheel with the same tire as the car, a small jack with jack stand,
as well as a proper sized socket on a breaker bar.
This way it can easily be fixed road side.
Then all I need do is pick up a new spare and toss it in the car.

If it hit the curb hard enough to bend that aluminum wheel that much, the tire is junk. Sooner or later it will blow out through the cracked or busted belts.
Also, if you have a different wheel available, buy the wheel as well. We had an accident with out PT and tire on one of the front aluminum wheels got damaged and had to be replaced. The wheel has been inspected many times, and everything looks good, but whenever it gets cold outside, that wheel looses about 15 lbs of air a day. I wish I would have insisted on a new wheel at the time of the accident. Gene

Potholes are so bad now someone needs to create an Android/iOS App that updates “realtime” to warn drivers with enough time to take evasive action. Perhaps the accelerometers in cell phones could record the jarring bump and automatically upload the GPS location the car was at seconds ago, kinda like how WAZE keeps track of speed decreases.

These low profile tires make the damage worse.

I also wonder what a Hunter Balance Center 800 lb roadload test would actually show on a repaired wheel versus a undamaged one.

Back in the days of One Lap of America, some Goodyear (IIRC) engineers entered a car with FOUR of those mini spares and drove it the whole distance at regular highway speeds with no problems.

I put 1300 miles on one in a rental car once and didn't spare the horses.

The coolest thing was I found one from a full size car that was exactly the same diameter as the regular wheel on my Hyundai, and it had the same 5 on 4 1/2" bolt circle. I put 630 miles on that one, speeds up to 90 (Utah interstate).

You just have to keep them inflated. And NO burnouts!

R.

If there was a database like this for the metro Detroit area, it would be so huge, you could never read it all!