Never in this economy

The well regarded aftermarket wheel company Apex Wheels is having a winter sale. Nothing like clearing out some inventory at year end to make the numbers look good. Today is Boxing Day, so go out there and buy buy buy, folks! It’s not like you didn’t just spent a small fortune on Christmas gifts. And then people complain about the cost of living being so high. Have you perhaps ever considered not buying anything?

I get it: the temptations are everywhere. 25 percent off for a set of wheels I’ve been eyeing is trebly enticing. It also coincides nicely with the fact the BMW M2 absolutely needs a new set of tires (this rainy season is going to be interesting if I delay). The timing is perfect. At least I’m not throwing away a perfectly good set of tires for the sake of making my car look different than factory. 10 years ago me would have done so, but thankfully I did not have much money back then.

What’s stopping me from hitting the checkout button on those Apex wheels is the lack of space. Where the heck am I going to store the original set of wheels? If I knew for sure I will be keeping the M2 forever, I would sell them. But because I am not prepared to do so, I must keep the stock wheels around just in case. Living in high-rent, low space San Francisco, I barely have enough room for my everyday. There’s simply no space for frivolities such as two sets of wheels for one car.

I can see now how public storage places are so numerous and popular. Customers are essentially paying rent for more space. It just so happens that space is detached from their main abode. I of course do not want to end up like that. Rent for the main abode is high enough as is!

Sad to say then I am not buying a second set of wheels.

Phone instead of nature.

I feel you, bro

Last time I was back at my parents’ place, my mother told me someone stole all four wheels off the neighbor’s brand new car. She woke up one morning, peaked across the street, and there it was: a Honda Accord tiled on cinderblocks. Why would someone steal wheels off a plain Honda Accord? Because the Honda sedan is ubiquitous. There’s so many of them on the road that the demand for spare parts (law of large numbers vis a vis collision accidents) must be equally sizable. That means a fresh set of (stolen) wheels (plus nearly new tires) should easily fetch many hundreds of dollars.

I do feel bad for the neighbor. According to mom, it’s some young adult who moved into the downstairs in-law unit across the street. The Honda Accord was the first new car he’s ever bought with his own money. Pretty exciting, right? I can remember that joy when I drove my Subaru WRX STI home from the dealership. So much joyful emotion that I nearly had an anxiety attack. Anyways, it has to suck greatly to see something so new and cherished (and expensive) being messed with by amoral thugs. That undercarriage is forever marred by being jacked up on cinderblocks.

I can empathize with that neighbor, too. It seems that particular block of Visitacion Valley is cursed for new cars. Back when my parents bought a brand new Toyota Corolla for me to begin college (many thanks), another set of thugs threw a cinderblock at the driver-side A pillar, while it too was parked on the street. It was a complete violation of the most precious object me (at the time, anyways). While the damage was fixed promptly, the car never felt the same to me since that incident. Sentimental value vanished alongside the purity of an unmolested new car.

Hopefully that neighbor doesn’t love cars as much as I do. If that Honda Accord is just an appliance to him, he’s going to get over the incident rather quickly.

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People watching.

Riding on rollerblades

About a year ago at work, our office chairs got reupholstered. A coworker made sure that his chair did not get lost in the shuffle - the one he parts with is the one he is to get back. It was easy enough: that chair has a feature distinct from the rest. Instead of the typical plastic casters the rest of our chairs have, the coworker’s chair has rollerblade wheels. On first impression, it looked completely weird. Can it even move properly?

I filed it to the back of my mind, chalking it up as a funky quirk of the coworker. The original casters on my chair works just fine!

Recently, however, I stumbled upon a tweet from someone I follow. He mentioned rollerblade wheel upgrade for office chairs, and how it is an excellent quality of life improvement, especially for work-from-home folks. The link to the Amazon page reveals a surprisingly low cost. For about $40 dollars, anyone can upgrade the casters on their chairs. I was intrigued, not by the promised benefits, but the price! It’s cheap enough to give it a go.

Performing the upgrade is super easy: the standard casters literally pop right off from the chair. The rollerblade wheels then pop right in. In less than a minute, I was done. I do suggest wearing gloves, because grease and dirt will get onto the hands.

I should have done this way sooner! Rollerblade wheels are such a revelation. Not only does my Herman Miller Aeron rolls incredibly smoothly, it’s also far quieter than before. I can glide from one end of the room to the other with minimal noise. The product claims it’s kinder to the floors, too, though my plastic laminate flooring didn’t suffer under the plastic casters. So I can’t confirm that part.

I’m going to ask at work if they can buy me a set for my office chair.

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Fresh wheels.

The Civic Type R has 20-inch wheels!?

One my biggest pet-peeves when it comes to modern automobiles is the needlessly enormous wheels that comes standard in cars, performance-oriented or otherwise. Why in the world does the new Honda Civic Type-R require 20-inch wheels? The car’s 235/30R/20 tires are practically rubber-bands, and surely the wheels themselves would explode at the first moment it passes over a modern city pothole.  

I’m old enough to remember 18-inch wheels were the gold-standard in performance cars, whilst any wheel sized 20 and above where the domain of automobiles frequently purveyed by rap stars and sports figures. I understand completely that having a thin-sidewall tires mean less flex and sharper turn-in, but automaker’s have got to balance that with the realities of contemporary road conditions, otherwise the car’s ride would be horrendous. A Ferrari road-car that seldom sees the road? Sure, give it the biggest wheel with the skinniest tire as you please, but not in a mass-produced hot-hatch like the aforementioned Civic Type R. 

If my ND Miata can offer the most sports-car purity this side of the wallet to a Porsche Cayman, all the while running on positively tiny 16-inch wheels shod in 195/50R16 spec tires, then there’s simple no excuse for other brands. 

Except there is, and I found it when I saw a base Jaguar F-Pace SUV running on base-model 18-inch wheels: it looked horrendously tiny. The reason automakers put unnecessarily large wheels on cars is the design dictates it! Engineering probably had no choice but to comply with design dictum even though deep down I’m sure engineers know how absurd it is. Colin Chapman would. 

I eagerly await someone to put some aftermarket RAYS wheels in 18-inch sizing on the Civic Type R. My guess it’d save many kilograms of weight (stock wheels are nearly 30 pounds each), but from a visual standpoint, likely lopsided and top-heavy. Blame the designers.