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Smooth wheel covers from scratch
I don't have any photos, sorry no camera, but I'll detail the process and parts.
I don't like destroying or tapping my car, and I certainly don't see much point in buying cheap wheel covers to mod when a good bounce at high speed will send them flying. I wanted to build a cheap wheel cover with what I had around the house and what I could actually obtain in my area.
I have a mountain of small wing shaped neodymium magnets from old hard drives. The shape of my rim let's me place 6 near the center of the wheel to hold the pans.
The pans are some cheap 16" starbasix from walmart, steel, about 8$ cad. clear 1/4" tubing from home depot is pulled around the rim of the pan to reduce any rubbing noises. A 3mm thick rubber tape about 1cm wide is on the inside rim to mate with the wheel rim and go over the tubing just slightly. The rest of the inside is sprayed with a rubber coating I found at Canadian Tire. 4 holes are drilled into the centre for metric m6 short bolts to come out. I secure them with a washer and lock-nut. It looks quite nice and people have told me it looks stock.
The mounts are made of rubber chair legs. I recently had been using 7/8 or 22mm chair feet from Home depot (albeit a tad short in length). There is a hole drilled through the centre and a bolt pushed out. Glues work but aren't needed. There was a problem as not all feet would go on without splitting a little so a zip tie and super glue was used to help with that.
These short feet alone were great for the back wheels as they didn't get very warm. I have however lost 2 pans in the process of figuring this all out.
I had been looking for a better solution for a while and came across a set of Stanley brand feet that were much longer than the lug nuts and also had a hex pattern inside. They look like a chunky cog wheel insert. What I did with these is I used 1-1/2" hose clamps, cut the length and superglued the end on again. The end piece is an expanded ring and helps keep the clamp from slipping. However the best part was being able to rotate the end piece so the hex pattern had a small lip inside. The hex would normally fit perfectly along the faces of the lugnut, but not the edges (22mm vs 28mm). the rotated would now sits in the groove between the nut and the wheel and has a better hold. The hose clamp (gear clamp) is just there for maximum safety.
Because of the price and redundancy I use 2 of the stanley feet and 2 of the generic black per wheel.
Over time the rubber tape will heat up and glue itself to the wheel rim. Without the clamps I have lost a rear cover only because I hit a curb doing a sharp turn. Front wheels will warm up the rubber feet and zip ties and can loosen them up while also making it difficult for the magnets to retain their normal properties. Hose (gear) clamps should have their screw bits positioned at the centre of the wheel to reduce balance issues.
Cost:
Magnets - free
short m6 Bolts - 25c each, 4 per wheel
washers - 10c ea, 4 per wheel
lock nuts - 35c ea, 4 per wheel
black rubber feet - 2.25 for 4
stanley rubber feet - 7.50 for 4
pans - 8 ea
rubber spray - 8, can probably do up to 12 pans depending on what you find.
Rubber tape - 9 and can do about 6 or 7 pans
tubing - 20ft for 6$
Super glue at the dollar store
Zip ties from some box I found in the garage.
Ways I'm going to improve this:
I found aluminum pans for 6.50 each. Hendrix supply sells them and they should be a good final design. The weight reduction and rust protection will be worth it. Hose spring clamps are my alternative method to keeping the feet on, if only because I wouldn't need an 8mm wrench, just pliers.
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