Cragar SS Wheels, Poor Quality?
 

I have always liked the looks of the Cragar SS wheel. I want to "put more rubber on the road" than my 14x6 Rally 1 will allow. Thought I would buy some 15x7 Cragars and put some 235x60x15's on them. After reading some threads here, and using the "search" function", I see that several people have had problems with new Cragar SS wheels with the chrome peeling, rusting, and pitting. I hate to spend $500 for these wheels if the chrome plating on them is so poor. I live in Tn., very little road salt, drive my car only a couple thousand miles a yr., never in snow or ice, always garage it, and keep everything clean and waxed. Have any of you had problems with the new SS wheels or have of you had good luck (no problems) with them? Is there any other wheel that looks like the SS but has better quality? I just hate to risk spending $500 for a piece of junk. Thanx.

I have had a set of Cragers on my coupe for almost 8 years.I have not had any problem with peeling.If I dont take care of them and be lazy I get a little rust line along one of the edges.If you want the easyest,get a one piece alu wheel like some of the Americans.I have 2 sets of Cragers and one set of Americans and still like the Crager look best.JMO,Tom

I had my cragar's that I bought new for about 5 years. 4 of those years the car was in the garage barely driven. Mine rusted and pitted fairly bad just along the outer edge of the rim; all 4 in the same area.

1. Had a set of SS wheels thirty years ago in NJ. Never had a problem with them.

2. I'm sure that the care and maintenance of the wheels will have a lot to do with the service life you can expect from them.

I've had a set on mine since August of 2002. No rust, peeling or any other issues. The car does stay garaged and has only been wet the few times I've washed it however. Except for some minor scratches under the wheel washers they look brand new. As a matter of fact, when Scott Esterle, from Summit Racing calls me back I'm ordering some 15 X 8's to replace the 14 X 7's I currently have on the rear. Need some traction......
Summit Racing has them cheaper than anybody and will mount and balance the tires if you get both from them.

They sell the Cragars with a true bolt pattern for a 66 gto?

I thought they were all unibolt. I hope I did not get ripped off.
fb66

don't use the unibolt style. get them in the true bolt style. better fit and less likely to have lug nut problems later on.

I just purchased a set last week{special order because of backspace} and they are unilug design.
John

It is to late for me. I special order the rims. They are the unilug. I am not sending them back. I don't even know if I can.

I will just have to live with it. I like the Cragar SS rims way better that rally I or II.

Did they always make the Cragar SS in the unibolt pattern?

Why do they make the unibolt pattern?
fb66

FB66, I've put 10,000 plus miles on mine and had them off dozens of times and never had any lug nut issues and they fit fine. I personally wouldn't worry about it as there is no problem. The unilugs have been around a long time. How long? Decades, at least. The unilug set-up allows them to fit 3 different bolt circles with one wheel. Is it the best way? No, of course not. Does it work? For me it has worked great. I now have a pair of 15 X 8's coming from Summit for the rear of my 69. The Radial T/A's I wanted (255/60-15) are on backorder, so I won't get them for a few weeks!
Your car looks great with the wheels/tires. Enjoy it!

Hi,
I bought a set of Cragar SS 15x7 for my 68 GTO. One of the wheels peeled the chrome in the bolt circle area. I called Summit and they said to send them pictures. I did. They said that the wheels are warranteed for only one year.
It appears to me that the wheel was poorly prepped prior to chrome plating and as a result it peeled off.
If I had to do it over again, I would buy American Racing Torq Thrust II wheels.
I bought, restored and installed a set of Rally II 17x7 wheels.
Mike

I've had several cragars over the years on various vehicles. They look cool, but they are prone to rust and peeling chrome problems... If cragars are what you want, get them. But yeah, consider Torq Thrusts as they look alot tougher in my opnion. In my opinion, Cragars are kind of the "if it don't go, chrome it" more show and less go wheel. Not to say that there aren't fast cars running cragars, because I'm sure there are!
I think the torq thrusts are lighter since cragars are steel and torques are aluminum (I might be wrong here, never owned a set of Torqs).

I have seen Cragars in specific bolt patterns, but the ones I had were unilug... so they fit a wider range of cars. That was nice, I had them on several different cars over the years... with different bolt patterns.

If you keep those cragars waxed and polished, they should stay shiney for a good long time and not rust. I'm sure mantainence has alot to do with it, as previously stated.

I've heard of guys tearing the centers out of a cragar on a hard launch... but that might be just a myth.

I've had mine on the car for 17 years. No problems at all.

However, I didn't use their washers. I used McGard(?). They are either aluminum or stainless steel. I think that has helped keep the rust away from the lug nut area.

The most important thing that I have always done, that I believe helps tremendously is: I never wash the car and let it sit. As soon as I'm done washing and drying it, I take it down the road at 55MPH and really "dry" them (spin the water out). This also warms up the brakes a little which warms up the wheels also. I believe this especially helps keep the rust away from the lug nut area.

I have a spare pair that I put the DOT slicks on. The last time I had tires put on them, about 4 years ago, the installer broke one. So one on my race wheels is only 4 years old. I've had no problems with it.

I have 15x8 cragars on both my '71 and '72. Both sets were purchased in 2000. Neither set has been subjected to harsh conditions, (except rain). All eight of them have either pitted slightly or rusted. The chrome is very thin and has worn down when trying to polish off the rust. I have bought cragar wheels for several cars since the late seventies, and the earlier wheels had vastly superior chrome.

Keystone used to make a wheel (raider), that looked exactly like the cragar and it too had very good chrome that never rusted, peeled, or polished off.

I absolutely love the look of cragar wheels but the quality is not what it once was. I also have chrome Torque Thrusts on my '88 Monte SS and the chome on those isn't that great either.

FWIW, my cars get driven a LOT.

I've had cragars on my 72 now for over 6 years. No pitting, no rust, plenty of shine.

http://images17.fotki.com/v293/photo...resized-vi.jpg

I LIKE AMERICAN RACING POLISHED ALUMINIUM. MINE ARE TRAK STAR SS

Cragar SS 610's.
 

Jeg's in now offering a new version of the Cragar SS wheel. It's called a #610 and it's an aluminum wheel, rather than steel, that is chrome plated. It sells for about $215 per wheel while the original SS (steel) sells for $125. Does anyone have any firsthand experience with this #610 model? Maybe this aluminum based version will resist the rusting and pitting better than the steel SS wheel.

I will throw in my own two cents here. I bought unilug wheels some time back and the darnbed things wobbled at all speeds-no matter how much effort went into balance , I even boughtnew tires. Finally got pissed off and switched over to torque thrust II's at 17 inches and 235/50/17's under the wheel wells with no effort. No wobble, awesomely smooth, much better looking, and stiffer control. You can feel the difference. DONT GET CRAGARS! BTW-they all rust. I have had several sets of them in the past. each one rusted at the lug nuts-starting with small pists, and progressing into major corrosion. Glad to be rid of them. Plus, they dont do well with high dust ceramic brakes. Easy to stain irrepairable. Just my 2 cents.

fastgtr

At least now I know it wasn't just me with the balancing problem. I have NEVER had a set that balanced properly. And I've had them on my '77 GP, '80 Cutlass, '83 GP, '76 GP, '76 Charger Daytona, '77 Malibu Classic, '69 Lemans, '70 Lemans, '71 Lemans, '72 GTO, '79 GP, '79 Camaro, '79 TA. ALL of them had a vibration problem at 62-65 mph. MOST of them were fine below or above that range. But I love the look so much I tolerate it.

The wheels may be fine for occasional driving, but if you use the car daily, or very frequently, they WILL rust or pit, or both.

Do they have a center hole or just a formed center? If they do have the hole, an adapter can be made to the 2.78" hub center.