wakeech

hey guys, imagine your perfect street wheel:
lighter (~3lbs less than stock), stronger (way more rigid), wider, and better looking (yes, very subjective thing), along with SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS for the RX-8's Tyre Pressure Monitor (namely, a seat for it, and a counterbalance designed INTO THE CENTER OF THE WHEEL, so you don't need that ugly weight tape), Paul Yaw's new RX-8 Specific wheel kicks serious ***:

check it out, post comments:
http://www.yawpower.com/wheels.html

:D i love them already

mikeb

They sound awesome but I would love to see them on the 8

Napboy

you're right, very subjective. would love to see them in 19" though.

Gord96BRG

Hmm - so that means that Canadians who buy these wheels end up with a strip of ugly balance weights since we don't have any TPMS sending units in our wheels!

Regards,
Gordon

Kuf

Very nice. Anything designed directly for the RX-8 is great! :D

M-ster

3 piece Rim,mmmmmm:D

$100 is that what it cost?

sun stroke

Gordon,

Yaw Powerl is going to make a wheel with the counterbalance and one without. The tire sensor is not necessarily desired in a racing applications which they have already thought of.

I really recommend going to the link Wakeech and I posted to see the full description of everything that will be available. There is a lot more than just the wheels in the works.

The really cool thing is that everything will be designed specifically for our cars!

wakeech

^bump^

SleepR1

I've never been a fan of exposed bolts, but I am excited about the prospects of a 9.5 wide x 18 fitment all around, with 255/40-18 tires. I totally agree that 19s are not worth having on the Rx8.

SleepR1

What is the stock width and offset of the Rx8 18-inch wheel?

Tresch

I think it would have been cool if they integrated the "soft triangle" rotar shape into the wheel somehow

sun stroke

Here is a picture of the Yaw Power wheel from Sevenstock...

I had a picture of it on their car also but can't find it, I will post it if I find it.

mikeb

its hard to say if I like them without seeing them on the 8

wakeech

i love "mesh" (multi-spoke) wheels to death... Paul, they're beautiful. congradulations man :D

M-ster

Something about the rim just not quite right. I'm not quite sure what exactly, but I think it's those spokes. I think the edge of the spokes are too sharp, it might look slightly softer with the edge slightly rounded off. Maybe it's just me...

Or maybe the 2 tones is a little too abrupt. I'm a fan of 2 tone rims, use to have these Momo on my Miata:

M-ster

Oopss, miss out the pix

red_base 95

Those would look killer on a titanium grey.

yawpower

Hi everybody,

Now that the prototypes are done, we are down to tweaking little details.

The biggest variable is cosmetics. We tried gunmetal, but my own opinion is that it is too dark. At least it seems that way on our red 8.

I will photograph the wheels just like they are on the car today. I will probably change them to a basic silver, or maybe a very light metallic gray. Someone else mentioned a very light gold. Similar to the original BBS color, but not as bright.

We're trying to find the best combination for the "standard" wheel, with options like painting the centers body color, or polishing as an option.

We will photograph these combinations, and post them to the website.

If any of you would like to make comments, we want to hear it. Good or bad. What I think of the looks doesn't really matter, I want to know what the average RX-8 owner would like to see.

We will also be changing the fasteners. The heads of the existing pieces are too big in my opinion. (What's your opinion?)

Thanks

synthtk

I liked the look of the wheels a lot, and liked the color because I think it would look nice on the Ti RX8, I agree about using the smaller fasteners, it will maybe make the silver lip not look as tall.

That is probably my largest complaint about the current rim, the silver lip looks really tall which makes the overall rim size seem smaller (not an 18) I think if the silver lip was a bit shorter it would make the rim look its proper size and overall improve the look of the wheel.

Is there anyway to get a dished effect with the current rim design?

Also I would probably remove the blue yawpower lettering, instead of that maybe have it etched into the lip or part of the centercap instead of the Standard RX8 Rotary centercap?

rx8daniel

The first pic I saw of the new wheel design I thought had a rotor design. Maybe those were the Mazda optional centers?
I want it to look good on the red too. I think it looks okay as is. Maybe the blue could be more subtle. I don't want the wheels to stand out so much they take away from the rest of the car. Silver or a BBS-type light gold might be nice. The main concern I'll have is when will I be able to afford to buy them!

yawpower

Hey there synthtk,

We are checking on availability of stock colors. It occured to me that the Mazda Ti color would look great on the Ti car.

Our original design used a different rim shell, and the center was 1" larger in diameter. Unfortunately, there was just no room for the tire pressure sensors. Another thing that occured to me is that dark colors make the wheel look smaller. I will disassemble the wheels and change the color to something lighter and photograph that as well.

That is also something we looked at with the initial design. Unfortunately, the calipers stick out so far that the outer rim shell must be relatively short. Maybe a better description is that the center must be nearly at the edge of the wheel to allow for caliper clearance.

We have more clearance than stock, so there is room for aftermarket calipers. Dave Lemon at Mazdatrix has developed a Brembo caliper kit which requires a small wheel spacer. If used with our wheels, no spacer is required.

We could have given it one inch more dish, but then it would have just barely cleared the stock calipers, and aftermarket pieces would not have fit. We tried to solve as many problems as possible in the design stage so that the wheels could accomodate everyone.

We could delete the lettering for those who do not want it. We may make a custom center cap later. We designed the wheel to accept the stock caps so that people could use the rotor caps from Mazda.

I just posted pictures at http://www.yawpower.com/wheelpics.html

Please let us know what you think. We will have ordering details available by the first of next week.

synthtk

Maybe also have a solid color option instead of having the silver lip

Ah I forgot about those, and I agree that darker wheels make the rim look smaller I have a set of 18s on another car that are black on the inside with a silver lip and they look more like 17s esp when off the car.

I would personally also like an option of having yawpower etched into the rim or the lip (lip preffered) I would like everyone to know who made these awesome rims

Cant wait :D

wakeech

ok, i saw the drawings, and i saw the real wheel... i was still thinkin' "meh, they're pretty ok"... something about the centres just didn't seem as appealing to my aesthetic sense as your classic BBS design... then, i saw them on the car:





ye gods man ... don't change a bloody thing. i like the big fat fasteners, the lip on the rim looks fine to me (yeah, a whole-wheel colour scheme might be more satisfactory for some owners)... i actually really like the contrast, especially with that iron-grey colour for the centres in these pics... they'd look just spectacular on a black RX-8 (the only colour i care about ).

bravo. i must say, they just look awesome.

mikeb

IMHO I think silver would look better

M-ster

Paul,

I agree with synthtk that the lip looks a little too tall/thick. Making the rim looks a tat too heavy. But if the 2 piece are of the same colour than it will be ok.

Yes, Paul, the fasteners could do with a little smaller, I'm a big fan of expose bolts, but still thinks that smaller fasteners will make the rim more slim line.

Paul, did you read my earlier post about the spoke's edges looking a little too sharp? Is that too late into your project to look into it as all your mold have been casted?

Colours: Very subjective, it will be great if you could do it with just basic color (eg. silver) but allow people to customise it to whatever color that pleases them. Then it would save you lots of headache.