What Cracked The Wheel?

Chinese steel When cold Will crack on impact, Even a gutter impact will do it

When wheels are made they are made from a coil of steel thats cut, rolled. Welded and formed. At the end of the coil they weld the next coil to old one, grind weld and keep machine running. That could be the coil weld or defect in steel. We have run into material defects many times. It happens.

Years ago, I worked at Union 76 station .The first thing my boss showed me was a deep gash directly over the tire machine in the ceiling beam, which was a Shell station years before, he informed me of a worker who basically had his head removed taking a split rim apart. I looked at the mark quite often .just to think I was standing and working where someone was killed....

You need an old Coates 20/20. Worked better than that thing you’re using to break down tires.

it is slightly flat there also ?... I think a chuck hole crack .... The manufacturing process probably creates stress in the metal and then an impact point caused the staight fracture IMO. .

Looks like someone put it in a cheap tire machine that had uneven jaw pressure and gave it the beans. That just happened to be the weakest spot.

JB WELD TO THE RESCUE!! 😎

Stellantis or FCA’s poor workmanship, and their contempt for their customers, is what gets you pieces of fecal matter like that; POFs!!!! Those are the words from Taryl Dactal, from Taryl Fixes All; a great small engine and lawn mower mechanic.

I'd call it a split rather than a crack, a defect that was there from the time that the wheel was manufactured, since it is straight and smooth and the wheel doesn't have any other damage. It must not have caused the wheel to leak air at first, but it grew during use until it was long enough to extend beyond the tire bead.

Chrysler wheels..hit a pot hole ..more times than not..that's all she wrote

Agree love your content. From this angle who knows whats happening here. I belive mass production rolling methods and work hardening along with a weld and cold water cooling may stress the area as many have observed. Defective steel.

Side note not related to this video... I appreciate you explaining to your inexperienced audiance that doesent have a keen eye to detail that of which is obvious to a experienced mechanical sort like myself. Your thoughtful insight saves your customers time money and their vehicles when they can be saved. Your time doing these videos is PRICELESS to all but a few of us. We are not there with you however. So I thank you for clearing-up some of our questions and critisisms when some have had said point, hopefully soildifying the breadth, girth, furthur depth of this learning journey this channel provides.

Morning Eric. The roads in the Uk are just junk at the moment. We are seeing many steel wheels cracked in various places around the rims too. Used to be just alloys. Modern stuff hey? They won’t take the bashing the old wooden ones did 😂 x

Low speed, deep hole situation. 🤣🍻

I would not let you near my expensive allow wheels with that piece of junk machine

Checking out the comments to see what the wheel experts are saying. Not disappointed.

It's the outer ring,your not wrong

When dealing with stubborn tires on steel rims I have found spraying soapy water on the inside of the partially de-beaded backside rim really helps get the tire loose with the shovel.

overhardened section and they hit something, that's a lot of rim offset way out from the "hub". it may not take much to break one in that case, plus who knows about previous tires, issues and machines?

the driver? 🤣🤣

Hit a pot hole in the cold. I've had that happen.

A hard hit in a pot hole and a bad batch of steel to make the wheel? Maybe to much carbon in the steel?

What is this, amateur hour on the tire machine!

That has to be hard on your back

To add my noise to a thousand other guesses.
I'm wondering it their manufacturing process forms the lip separately from the barrel. If so that could be the welding line for the lip as they certainly wouldn't want it to line up to the barrel's weld. Another similar possibility could be that the crack is where the original mill roll was welded during manufacture at the steel mill.

You forgot the third screw on the heater door actuator on the Buick, I know it's a pain but professional?

Wow that must be some kind of metallurgy or manufacturing defect. I have bent up steel rims hitting potholes here in the rust belt but never cracked a rim.

Coats tire changer. I approve!

Weld it grind it ship it.

nothing a little JB weld cant fix

The finest Chineseium

On today episode. Eric Talks about crack.

Made in China

Any body else squinting their eyes to see that crack? lol

Weld it, grind it, mount it, balance it, and be done.

Definitely a curb strike

Rims are pretty bulletproof somebody probably struck a curb

Chinese fatigue

Dei hire ..

I always bet on the woman curbing it. Women drivers no survivors.😮

I can only part-see rubber protection on the claws on the tire machine..? I only say this a motorcyclist who has had his rims chipped by a careless mechanic.

Regarding the crack, thats a stress crack as you can see it meandering. Correct me if Im wrong, but on some wheels, the outer rims are welded to the hub/rim after the fact..?

It is hard to say without looking at the fracture surface. Some possibilities are fatigue and impact. There might have been a small notch in the rim that would initiate the crack. The straight line is common in ductile materials where the force driving the crack does not greatly exceed the fracture toughness of the material.

Looks like one side ofbthe split does have a tiny bend as if from an impact.

When a tire is run flat and the side walls are completely wiped out you cant break the bead with a machine because there is nothing there to push on. I have used a cut off wheel to cut the bead like many others and to me it looks like this is what has happened here. Someone got a little greedy with their cut and got the wheel by accident.

That’ll make the tire leak won’t it? Looked to be cracked inside the bead

That is a welding problem, possibly due to incorrect material (too much carbon in the steel, not enough alloying elements, or poor heat treating before/after weld.) being used

When I was working at a timber mill over here in Australia (Tea Gardens,NSW) in 2011 2 of the alloy wheels on my 2002 model Holden VY SS Commodore got buckled because the council in the area was doing some roadworks & they didn't have any safety signs up saying stop or slow down.

There was a 300 millimetre (about a 1 foot) deep ditch in the road & I drove right into it at about 80 km/h (50 mph) & I had a tyre blowout on the right hand front wheel so I fitted the spare wheel.
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It's basically the same suspension setup as the Australian delivered Pontiac GTO & I replaced all of the struts which were blown out as well as the front strut mount bearings which were smashed to smitherines, I also replaced the rear shock absorbers, all 4 coil springs, front ball joints, front outer tie rod ball joints, & rear toe link rod ball joints as well as all of the rubber bushes which I replaced with polyurethane bushes to fix a pre existing problem where the left hand rear tyre kept scrubbing out because the OEM left hand Inner rear control arm bush was made out of nylon & it was distorted.

The right hand side inner nylon bush was o.k. but I replaced them as a set of 4 polyurethane bushes including the outer control arm bushes.

A few years later I noticed one of those rims was losing air & I kept on having to pump the tyre up, it came time after one of my nieces jazz ballet performances that it was almost flat again so I drove it to the nearest petrol station & pumped it up with air.

That night I took the wheel off the car then I got a paint brush then I made a very concentrated mix of dishwashing liquid & water then I brushed it around both sides of the rims & tyre beads.

It was on the Inner side of the rim that I noticed that it was blowing bubbles & I found it had cracked perhaps due to fatigue, right on the slight buckle so I think that fatigue caused the crack.

So I threw a spare alloy wheel onto the car (the spare rim wasn't buckled) & after some time I got a local tyre shop to send 2 of the rims away to be re rolled then the cracked one was welded up then machined on the tyre side of the wheel rim, they also fitted new tyres at a total of $380 AUD per wheel including balancing & the repair of the rims.

I have smoothed both rims out, filled any deep scratches & smoothed out the weld on the inner side of the rim with body filler, since quite a lot of the paint was chipped off on the inside of the rim I wire wheeled the old paint off using a circular brass wire wheel & cordless drill,then after I body filled the deep scratches, gutter rash & the scratched alloy rims I smoothed the body filler out & I scuffed the rim up with 240 grit sandpaper.

I prepped the rims with wax and grease remover then I applied etch primer to the rims because I had to go back to bare aluminium alloy on the inside of the inner side of the wheel rim.

I then applied several layers of filler primer to the wheel rims to fill in the scratches then I stencilled them with black spray paint to make sure that all of the highs & lows were filled in evenly.

I then smoothed the rims out with 400 grit wet & dry sandpaper,soap & water, I prepped the rims again with grease and wax remover, masked the tyres using masking tape & newspaper then I painted the rims with acrylic lacquer silver wheel paint & acrylic lacquer clear coat paint to bring the shine out on the rims which turned out pretty good.

The paint hasn't fallen off since 2023 & I have 1 more rim which needs straightening, 3 of them still needs to be painted,I just need a job so I can afford to do that !

crack = cheap and cheap recycled steel , the same crap the vehicle frame and etc... is made from ....Older Frames and etc... did not rust out like they do today -

It looks like someone took a grinder to cut a tire off of it before. I have done it on that type of rim before. I work at Mavis tires and brakes.

Probably cracked cuz of a lady driver.