Aftermarket alloy wheel suppliers

[Cheasy]

Hi,

I’m just about to move into Golf GTI ownership and want to get a set of 18” alloys for winter use. The OEM ones seem to be hard to come by second hand or mighty expensive from VW. I’ve seen loads of sets on eBay that are modelled on VW originals but at the same cost for 4 as 1 from VW I’m concerned about the quality.

Does anyone have a trusted supplier they use, or know of somewhere that produces quality alloys that you would recommend?

Many thanks,

Chris

[Guzzle]

Aftermarket wheels can vary greatly in quality. You can get BBS, Borbet or Ronal wheels (they make some of the VW wheels amongst others) from the likes of Rimstyle, Wheelbase etc. Or look on eBay.

I bought a set of brand new OEM Skoda alloys for mine. They were £600 at the time and the quality and fitment is identical to Golf wheels. The centre caps are slightly smaller though.

[Guzzle]

A few members also liked these;-

http://www.golfgtiforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=284340.msg2597898#msg2597898

[jv]

The price of wheels from VW must have an absurd margin applied to them. This makes aftermarket appear suspiciously cheap which in turn causes people to worry and go to VW. What a great setup 

[Cheasy]

Thanks both. The dealer quoted me £748 for an 18” alloy without the tyre, crazy money.

[Guzzle]

Erm, yeah.

Don't be paying that 

[Gnasher]

I'm running the cheapest BBS alloys (I think) you can get.

BBS SR - mine are 19" but the 18s are very reasonable and seem properly strong. I got mine on ebay from a seller in Germany (something like "Reifen Geselle") and they contacted me outside ebay to get around the fees (which worked out £80 cheaper for me) and they arrived quickly and had no issues.

Got to say - don't scrimp on the quality when buying wheels. Apart from the worry of them being weaker, another area they cut back on is the quality of the finish which means you might need to end up refurbing them, bringing the price up to some with a better finish.

[Cheasy]

Cheers Gnasher

[Jim_mk7.5]

Think a few people have replica OEMs such as Prets from CM wheels who have an eBay shop and no issues. You can get 19 Prets for about £500 which is a huge saving. Not saying they are like for like. There are also plenty of decent aftermarket ones that have an OEM style such as Borbet FF1 for not daft money.

[MKgti]

CM wheels 18" Pretoria copies in gun metal which I have for winters.
Good quality.