Hot Rods Rare? Yes, Valuable? Yes, THAT valuable? uhm maybe?

I had this come across my Facebook feed earlier today. What they are asking for is a bit much, ya think?

* note, I am not interested in buying them, just thought it was interesting.

 

I guess it depends upon how much money you have at your disposal. They certainly aren't anywhere near that valuable to me.

 

Not an expert on these, but this seems odd. First, a 16" wheel in 1978 would have been on a one ton or possibly 34 ton truck, not a car. I am not even sure if you could get a 16" car tire back then. Plus they are undrilled- odd that they would be sold like that by any company. I am not a collector so to me, the price is as unreasonable as the wheels are suspicious.

 

The undrilled thing doesn't suprise me too much since a lot of these went onto super specialty cars, some getting drilled for actual knockoffs or "pin drive" wheels or maybe some exotic bolt pattern so they let the end user drill them to order.

But the tire size does surprise me with that date, I know it was a big deal in '81 when the Ferrari 308 used a 16" car tire to fit over bigger brake rotors, and again in 84 with the Corvette. And if these were intended for some racing tire application, I wouldn't expect 6" and 10" size, road race cars would probably have all 4 the same size (wide) and a drag car would have something much narrower on the front I would think.

I'm intrigued to know if his dates and/or wheel measurements are correct. A lot of people mis-measure wheels (going to the outer edges instead of the bead seat) but for someone asking $8000 you'd think they'd know how to measure at least.

 

I had 16x10 mag 6 pin Sprints on my '23 roadster built originally in 1969. 16" slick was not unusual back then (ran M&H 16's on them). Front, not so much.

 

Of Course you could get 16" tires in 1978. I did

 

Eight freaking grand.

 

Damn!
Those wheels are the equivalent of a "perfect storm" so to speak, magnesium (with Dow 7 coating), check, 16", check, undrilled, check, no longer being made, double check.
Someone will step up, because thats how the other half lives!

 

Doesn't surprise me a bit when you see $3,000 dashboards, and $5,000 grilles listed.
There is even a KR Wilson employee badge for $10,000 on EPAY.
Tulipmania all over again.
The parts bubble is showing signs of topping just like the car bubble did.

 

They could also be wheels that failed a production test that should have been destroyed but somebody may have snatched them out of a scrap pile....

 

Yep...little on the high side for me......at the Pate swap meet this past week a guy had a pair of un-drilled - un-tapped - no name aluminum flatheads for about $500.....they looked neat but not sure what it was going to make them ready for bolt on.

 

I can see it. Just because they are pricey to you doesn’t mean there isn’t a guy out there salivating over them right now. They sure are pretty. And pretty rare.

 

Last weekend at a local swap meet a vendor had a pair of magnesium Halibrands for $2,000. I moved on. I know where there is from a front engine dragster from the 60's/70's . I keep the hook in the water but no nibbles yet .

 

There were guys running 16's back then, but it was mostly drag cars. 10x16" were popular Halibrand and ETIII sizes.
On the street you would occasionally see 16" Hali's and ETIII's, for the most part it was Hiboys (ie: Lobeck, Jake Jacobs) running Firestone diamond dirt track tires, many times paired up with "implement" front runners. I seem to recall BFGTA's may have been also offered in 16's?
The 6"x16" wheels seem kind of an odd size, but Halibrand as well as others such as American Racing made some crazy ass sized wheels back then.
$2000 per wheel seems nuts, but if they're just the ticket for someone's million dollar Ridler or AMBR build, what the hell. What's it cost to have someone carve out a set of custom wheels? Can't be cheap.
$2000 for a SET of 4 wheels seems steep to me, but I'm a traditional scrounger.

Damn beautiful wheels. They really do need to be on a car.

 

For that price the wheels should come with a car.

 

They do, a U-Haul pick up with the rental agreement in your name.

 

Very much outside of my budget and wheelhouse, but as far as someone spending $8K+ on wheels, while maybe not the norm, is common enough in other sections of the car hobby, especially in the pro-touring muscle car and lifted and lowered truck groups, its pretty common to see wheels in the $1500-$2k a piece price range, and those are just new, anyone with a credit card can get them, rather than something older and rare.

 

sprint cars were 16 inch for many years- 16X6:00 rib fronts and 16 X 10:50 or 11:00 diamond tread rears

 

if you have a $100,000 restored race car [not hard to do anymore}whats $8000 for the correct wheels?

 

Someone, somewhere, will buy them for their Kindig or Foose, or Troy built car that will come with a matching trailer and ten thousand dollar display. And that is all right. That is a part of the hobby/lifestyle. For me however, my Cragar wheels look nice too...
And I can still afford a hamburger on cruise nights.