Today I was trying to park away from cars to avoid door dings, so I park way over in a spot with a concrete curb on one side. Like a dumb-*** I get a little too close and hear that horrible scraping sound. Luckily the damage is limited to the outer edge of the wheel and not as bad as it could have been. It sounded like I had scraped half the side of my car! I feel like an idiot. I knew it was easy to damage the wheels. Why wasn't I more careful?! I was curious to know how many other drivers have had this unfortunate experience.

 

doesn't happen to me since im a good driver

 

I bought my car used with about 18-20k miles on it and the previous owner had managed to curb both drivers side wheels.

So far in the 2 cars I've owned I have not managed to curb a wheel yet. I usually have a problem of parking to far away from curbs rather than to close because I am to worried about hitting one.

 

I have not curbed with my 8 yet buy I did my old car once trying to get close enough at the bank drive-thru that I didn't have to lean way out the window to reach... Drive through places are the only time I really have to be careful not to... At this point I'd rather have to hang my entire body out of the window than get too close and scrape the curb though haha.

 

I did it the night before Halloween, backing into a tiny space, steep hill, narrow unlit road. At least the fact that it was a difficult parking job is a minor consolation.

The other day I saw a woman grind along the curb for 100' trying to squeeze between cars to make a right at a light. I'll let you guess her ethnicity, you racists. :P

 

White anglo saxon pretestant?

 

I'm on my 3rd set of wheels......

THANK YOU CENTRAL FLORIDA ROADS!!!!!

 

you can get it fixed, but its not cheap. Around here its about 150 to 200 dollars a wheel, and you have to do two at a time if you want the colors to match. That being said you would never know it even happened.

 

Thanks for the repair info., but I think I could buy an OEM wheel for $200.00. They are the stock silver alloy wheels. The damage is actually fairly minor (maybe 3 in. on the outer edge) so I plan on just living with it. I'm just pissed at my own stupidity.

 

It always looks the worst right after you do it.... After a while it kinda smoothes out and the coloring starts to match slightly better. Obviously it wont look like nothing happened, but it will look better and less noticeable than it does right now

 

I curb my wheels so much that I dont cared anymore. it will happen eventually

but when I get new wheels I will be real careful (another year or 2 later?)

 

Modest as well...

 

I'm usually pretty good about that... didn't curb my OEM wheels for 3 years then got aftermarket. Had my aftermarket for a little over a year and was trying to sell the car/part out. Just as I was starting to sell the wheels I guess I cut a turn a little too close to the curb. It always sounds so much worse than it is... I was convinced the wheel was destroyed lol. Was fairly minor, but still noticeable.

 

I damaged one of my f14 wheels when pulling away from a drive thru bank. Hate those narrow lanes!
It was very minimal though, so I used a black sharpie to cover the scratch. Hardly noticeable now.

 

I saw these guys called "Alloy Wheel Repair" on Motorweek. They are a mobile service. They have a van fitted for wheel repair/refinishing and do the work while you wait:

http://www.awrswheelrepair.com/
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/goss/3001.shtml

Would be nice to have curb rash repaired without having to ship the wheels off somewhere. I've never tried them, but next time I curb a wheel (happens about once every 3 years), I'll probably give 'em a try.

 

Well that's too bad. That's why your first two cars should be beaters.

 

It happens pretty easy to a daily driver. Cars aren't going to stay perfect when driven year round, in parking lots, on rough roads, etc.

There are wheel repair shops that can usually fix them for about $50-100 each so it's not a super big deal.

 

Doesn't matter how good of a driver you are, **** will still happen when you daily drive your car. Can't keep it a 'Beauty Queen' forever lol.

On a serious note, it does create a horrible feeling when a curb rash happens. You just gotta' be as careful as possible, so that you can minimize the chances of it happening, and that's all you can do.

I feel that my R3 wheels are super prone to curb rashes since the tires have very slim sidewalls, and plus the wheels are 19". Fortunately, I took my dealer up on the warranty offer which covers all curb rashes, windshield chips, dents/dings, and rips/tears on the interior leather & cloth......All for $299 for 3 years. Not a bad deal I suppose.

 

never personally done it, but a few days ago i let my brother borrow my 8 and now i have my 2 left wheels with curve damage..lol..needless 2 say he wont be driving my car anymore..and yeah like that guy said earlier its about 150 to get it fixed and re painted..but idk if the color match will work all that great

 

Just about every dealer has a "wheel guy" they'll use to fix lightly curbed wheels on used vehicles that still have good value as part of the detailing process before the cars are put on the lot. A lot of these guys are contracted because they were the lowest bidder, so with a little work you can probably find someone rather cheap if you ask around. When I bought my previous car a few years ago both wheels on the passenger side looked like ***, so I guess whoever owned it always parked near a curb and obviously wasn't very good at it. The dealer offered to do the wheels for about $150 each but I was certain I could do better. They were dumb enough to give me the name of the guy they used, so I just called him myself and he did both for $75 a piece under the condition that I brought the wheels to him and gave him a few days. He wound up doing a really good job and saved me about 50%, so just snoop around dealer lots and see what you can find out.

 

damm thats a good deal! lol, im gonna start snooping around now! lol

 

I'm super careful parking so I haven't curbed my 8, but I have curbed my big old van a number of times. The wheels never hit the curb because of the fat tires, so I didn't worry much, plus it's so big for a first car I was bound to screw up before shaking the stupid teenage driver out of me. Also, It sure was easy to park a jetta (my second car) after driving that behemoth!

 

my first vehicle was a john deer that had a small block v8 in it. yep I was that 14 year old ******* you were stuck behind on the back roads lol

 

Should be easy enough to find a cheap/good quality repair guy around here.

 

well yeah im still looking around..the cheapest i found was 140 for each, but i gotta leaver my car with them..or one for 160 each, and i get a temp tire so i can keep my car with me..but im still looking around