...Very crappy, blurry, tiny pics. I don't have a "real" digicam, so these're from my phone. I didn't bother rotating the sideways ones because it would recompress the JPEG and make it even more crappy, so just turn your head sideways.

I bought these wheels for the weight first and style second, so no, they're not the sexiest things I could find. I also think gun metal is too close in color to the car to be a good match; it'd be like wearing black shoes with dark navy pants (especially since a CG TSX has a slight blue tint).

Velox ProGear PG-5S vital stats:
17.0x7.0
5/114.3
+42 offset
Forged
Gun metal color only
12.5 lbs or so
620 kg max load
4 for $1435 shipped with hub-centric rings from wcperformance.com

Stockers on floor:


Suspended at Goodyear with a couple Velox rims on, one well bare, and one with the stock wheel still on:


^^^ Yes, you can see my plates, but it wouldn't take a genius to figure out it's my car if you saw it on the road.

Suspended at Goodyear with the Velox rims installed (before the guy had to take them all back off to install with hub-centric rings):





On the ground, so you can see the fit better (it's only a +42 offset, on a 17x7 wheel):


Scratched paint from the torque gun, which was too girthy for the rims' narrow lug bore (giggle all you want at that sentence):


^^^ I hope that chipwon't make the rest flake, or lead to rust or anything. Will it lead to further deterioration, or is that the worst of it?

My quotes were $141 from Firestone, $100 from Goodyear, and $40 from Pep Boys... until I showed up, and then it was $80 from Pep Boys and I'd have to show up at 10 AM Sunday morning and hope I was there before anyone else. I hate being jerked around, so said fuck it and went to the Goodyear on De Anza in Cupertino even though $100 is still more than $80. I dropped it off at 3:30, they started around 4:30, and they finished at 6:30 or maybe a little after (I watched for a bit, and they were trying to be careful as not to scratch the rims). Adam did the install, while Eric at the desk gave me the quoted price even when he realized 17" rims are supposed to be $32/ea instead of $25/ea. I was pretty nervous when Adam, who was very young (HS or early college age), sort of made it obvious he didn't know what the hub centric rings were or which way they were supposed to go on.

Still, I haven't noticed any problems in the 75 or so miles I drove tonight to test them out, so I guess he did it right. I'll give a list of impressions, but I warn you that I've driven only maybe 10K miles before getting my TSX and 7950 since, so I'm not the most experienced driver. So I'm not sure what's psychosomatic and what's really different; I mean, if I spent the same $1400 on gold plating, I'd probably say my car felt faster then, too.

Without further ado:

• It still doesn't shoot off the line, but feels a little less inhibited from the get-go.
• I still feel 3300 lbs + my weight in the hard turns. But something feels easier about changing lanes on the freeway... is it just me?
• I want to say it feels faster, like it leaps forward on downshifts, but hell, my TSX was still surprising me even before I got the rims.
• I expected to feel bumps less due to less force needed to attain the same up/down acceleration given the lower mass (F = ma), but I'm not sure there's a difference. If anything, I was paying more attention to bumps because of the expectation.
• The most obvious difference is that the speed decay seems retarded. That is, I kept thinking, "I don't need to brake, because I can let up on the gas and my speed will decay naturally before I get close to that guy," and then I'd find myself up his ass and on the brakes. Could be a nice win on mileage, but not enough to pay off the investment by itself.
• When I first test drove the TSX in a 35 zone, I felt like I was doing my normal 40, and it turned out I was doing 50. Same effect all over again: I'd be doing a nice 50 on Page Mill and suddenly be at 60 after just tapping the gas to maintain speed! No hard lurches; it just effortlessly and gracefully accelerates.

 

Not sure why those middle pic URLs won't parse. Maybe the parentheses. Just cut-and-paste, or go to the pic directory, scroll down, and hit "View as an image gallery." The lost pics are on the last page.

 

Do you notice any vibration at speed?

Also, what inside diameter hub rings were used?

 

Haven't noticed any vibrations yet.

I didn't measure the rings that the company finally sent, but I forwarded them the following email fragment from a Velox sales rep:

 

dnl2ba -- My biggest question is top gear acceleration. Do you notice any improvement in 5th gear @ highway speed?

 

I'll pay more attention to it Monday, when I have my 20-mile commute. There was a surprising amount of traffic Saturday night and I didn't get to play around as much as I'd've liked.

Not sure if my having 84 lbs of stock wheels in my trunk / back seat might've slightly mitigated the apparent change.

On the topic of reducing unsprung weight, I found this AudiWorld post last night. His findings make reducing unsprung weight sound significantly less exciting than the 8:1 ratio Centerline mentions, but of course, Centerline is trying to sell stuff. Other ratio numbers I've heard are 3:1, 4:1, and 6.5:1, which are obviously vastly different (and around 4:1, I start feeling like $1400 is way way way too much to spend just for the performance benefit).

He's also giving weight reduction maximum benefit of the doubt by calculating as if all the weight were at the edges of the tires, making every pound count as much as possible. So this is a better-than-best-case calculation.

Sucks! I've only cut about 8.5 lbs per wheel. I can bring it to 13.5 if I get Toyo T1-Ss, but then I'd feel dumb for already having shelled out $100 to swap wheels when I could've gotten tires done at the same time. Anyone know what the tread rating on the stockers is?

 

It's definitely true that the farther the weight is from the axis the more effect it has on the moment of inertia. That's why I was planning on going ot some t1-s tires and slightly cheaper/less light 16lb rims. I just haven't found the right combo yet and felt like pulling the trigger.

 

Well, if we assume he's right, even with his generous and optimistic calculations, the effective difference on the weight of the car probably isn't worth even, say, $800, never mind reduced rim strength.

However, unsprung weight also affects a couple other things:

• Ride quality (lighter unsprung components take less force to move, meaning less work for the suspension)
• Handling characteristics

 

unspring weight reductions have different effects on cars depending on their torque characterisitcs. I odn't know what kind of car the audi guy was looking at but if it was an s4 or v6 then the unsprung weight would definitely be less important for acceleration. We already know the tsx is somewhat torque challenged even though it's a great motor. With previous gen accord v6s, old 3.0 maximas stevtec has analyzied it to a close to 8:1 ratio given time slips he has seen and the ability to replicate those gains in cartest. I think he's probably pretty accurate on vehicles with those kinds of torque outputs.

The biggest thing to remember is light rims give you acceleration, braking and handling improvements all wihout sacrificing any warranty. In my mind it's the best mod out there.

 

Makes me feel mo betta.

Okay, I had some brief expressway runs today (up to about 40-50 MPH, but only for a couple minutes). It erm... does feel lighter? The acceleration difference is noticeable right off the line, but not much elsewhen. (Didn't have a chance to test 5th gear acceleration specifically-- there was nothing to accelerate to in traffic.) Changing lanes does indeed feel smoother somehow.

Something I neglected to mention last night is that I sometimes feel that freefall sensation for a fraction of a second when I hit a bump at 40+ MPH now. Happened several times on the freeway last night and maybe once on the expressway today. Weird... but thrilling.

 

It's abysmal, but I never tried / paid attention to 5th gear acceleration before. So I don't know if it's more or less abysmal than before. :P

Felt really sporty today. If it's the placebo effect, I need a prescription for sugar pills. I found the weightless feeling when going over medium-size road irregularities thrilling.