Here’s something that may or may not be an innovative wheel-disc method. I was playing with an expansion-type drain plug at work and it sparked a really smart solution for mounting discs on my OEM 5-spoke alloys. I had a section of conveyer belt material which I cut several pucks from with a hole saw. Then I made several HDPE spacers from an old industrial cutting board the same way. For the sake of overthinking, I used aluminum plate from an old street sign and Swiss-cheesed the plastic spacers carefully. These were all smoothed and polished by clamping them onto a bolt and using that as a spindle in the chuck of my drill press. This can also be done with a hand drill but it’s more tricky.
The discs are just reused from my very first ecomodder project, because I’m too lazy.
They follow the K.I.S.S. Principle, or at least I hope. You just pop them in to the centre of the wheel, and tighten the centre-nut. This clamps against the rubber, which expands against the wheel. They are rock solid and can’t be pried out unless loosened. I feel the rubber helps with vibration dampening as none of them have come loose. They also weigh next to nothing. Don’t even register on a fishing scale. Maybe 1lb each or less. Thankfully, they aren’t hard to remove.
Overkill? Perhaps, but I like to plan around Murphy’s Law. I did it all for $0 as well.
*They are a bit too convexed for a proper low-drag disc, which can be fixed. I’m too lazy and will do that some other day.
