CP

Hi,

I was at Weissach on Wednesday, and talked to Asgar quite a bit as they are having their annual RUF wheel sale, of up to 25% off. I asked why my 18" RUF wheels by OZ are so heavy and what lighter RUF wheels are available to replace them.

He laughed and asked if I'm from the U.S. I said yes and asked why. He said Americans are totally fixated on unsprung weights. The rest of the world is not, as we cannot drive at speeds the RUFs are designed for. He had driven RUFs at 200+ MPH with both regular RUF wheels and lighter magnesium RUF wheels, and at that kind of speed, the regular RUF wheels help the car deliver better performance, as there is a little more weight at the corners for stability. In addition, with the RUFs delivering 420HP - 590HP, they don't really worry about another 10 lbs on each wheel. It could be different for a regular Carrera at 275 HP.

Evidently RUF has their reasons to choose the OZ wheels at that weight. It sometimes goes against our ingrained believe, but they have a valid reason for their decisions.

His explanation makes sense to me, as my experience and research is that RUF leaves no stone unturned to deliver the best performance, it'd seem odd that they would overlook a matter as simple as unsprung weight. At lease now I kind of know the answer. Just thought I'd share this with you folks.

CP

993RS

Thanks! I always did wonder why Ruf would have such heavy wheels on their cars.

kary993

I find this sort of funny in that the Le Mans, Daytona, Sebring, etc. etc. etc. winning cars all use light weight wheels. I do not see bricks for wheels on the GT3RSR's running at around 400 hp! The old GT1 cars did not use bricks as wheels either and were traveling at vary high speeds...enough to lift of and fly in fact!.

These are sports cars folks not land speed record cars

STLPCA

I guess the F1 teams that spend millions to shed grams of unsprung weight must apply different rules of physics. ... and they're not even fixated Americans. Makes no sense to me, but then I'm not an automotive engineer, ... although I've deposed some.

Macca

Hi Guys,

Porsche themselves used heavier wheels for their 993 performance cars. Think 964 3.6 turbo, 993 RS, GT2 and the Mark1 GT3. All road variants of their hi po cars in the last 12 years have used relatively heavy wheels. RUF build fast road cars not race cars so perhaps theres a clue there. I would imagine strength is also a factor these manufacturers consider when looking at 200mph type road transport.

Just a thought....

Macca the Kiwi

STLPCA

... and was that hollow spoked 993 TT wheel an expensive mistake? BTW, so how do those "heavier wheels" you listed compare in weight?

TB993tt

Alois Ruf was quoted explaining that his relatively heavy 17" wheels used on the original 1987/8 Ruf CTR acted in a gyroscopic way to keep the CTR tracking straight during its 210+mph runs. That anecdote aside, I think it is to do with the strength of the heavier wheels, Techart's wheels are also all on the heavy side.

Dr. No

And aren't the Supercups on the 993 RS on the heavy side? I've always wondered why they'd put a "heavy" wheel on a car they're otherwise trying to make as light as possible.

sonny1

Heavy wheels=cost less money,more profits.
Light wheels=cost more money,less profits.
The lightest wheels money can buy,are the best wheels money can buy.,follow?

kary993

Maybe my approach was wrong here. The RUF guy laughed at the Americans for wanting lightweight wheels. Maybe we should be laughing about their heavy wheels and attempts to go over 200mph?

nile13

Europeans are not particularly interested in light wheels because they are much more interested in top speeds than acceleration (witness their engines and you'll know).

I do think that we are overly obsessed with light wheels here and if you ask 99% of Hondah crowd who started the craze here, they will not know why exactly the lightweight wheels are better.

Just to implicate myself, I race on 25 lb wheels. Oh, wait, that's 25 lbs for a wheel and a tire together

kary993

Miike,

I think you are right about people not knowing why the lighter wheels are better for racing anyway. I can certainly attest to running heavier wheels and then running lighter wheels, the times come down, particularly in auto-x where you have to slow down and speed up again....it is the speed up part that really gets ya with heavier wheels. By the same token heavier wheels are harder to slow down as well. Do the Europeans worry about slowing down from over 200 mph?

993RS

You bet we do! We don't want to overshoot the entry to the supermarket parking lot do we???

Suwipin

Hi Dan,

Talking about F1 teams, we've actually just witnessed several Ferrari F1 cars doing crazy times (1:09) at Laguna Seca today (Monterey Historic Race weekend). The track record (1:07 by a Cart driver) was still un-broken though

Regarding lightweight wheels, being an average driver, I personally can't tell (on the track) the difference when I used the standard hollow spoke wheels as compared to when I used lighter aftermarket wheels.

I'm sure that if you're a very good driver that you'd probably feel the difference.

As far as RUF wheels being heavy, my only question would be why would you want to get heavier wheels than the stock wheels? The only thing that I can think of is "for looks" and that is a highly subjective topic.

CP

Pin,

Do you have pics of the event that you can share? I missed it again. Fortunately for balance, the Vancouver culinary excursion was a total success. I gained so much weight, it does not matter how much the RUF wheels weight anymore.

I don't think RUF put extra HEAVY wheels on their cars. They are just not the lightest wheels available today, that's all.

CP