March 2020: The alloy story
The itch for the alloy really began when I saw this one parked near office on a lazy Sunday shift break. The calculating the costs and the worthiness of investment on an anyway-to-be-scrapped in 15-year car. It would sum up to almost or more than on-third of the worth of the car. So made up my mind to live stock and change the tyre when the current set is worn out.
Then saw this one, my all-time favorite design, when I lost all control and started searching OLX and Facebook Marketplace.
The simple short story.
Highly inflated price and no room for (read lack of skill for) negotiation again put things on hold. It was my wifey, who motivated, why not buy one if you love to and my friend Harish, who would dig up something daily from Olx. Each time I would ask opinion with my brother,
@vishnu vichu and
@varunkumar2910. Like that many awesome designs and deals slipped between cup and lip, Enkei, Vossen, Lenso. We would message them on Olx and wait and after many days the reply would be "SOLD" Fed up with this, I lost my mind and again made up my mind, let's be stock. If I can find a decent set with tyres before my current set wears out, I would buy one. Budget was 25k max and was open to 14 and 15 inchers.
Then one day Harish, WhatsApp'd an FB link of this Lenso replica. Everyone was okay with it except the gold color. Negotiated the price, we got a deal. It was the weekend just before lockdown. We had to go to Kottarakkara anyway to pickup mask from a wholesaler. This was on the route. He said to come by Monday, when his new set of wheels will arrive. In Kerala, there was a mock-up lockdown announced 2 days before GOI's whole country lock down. So, I smelt it's now or not anytime soon. He agreed to meet, but no guarantee on the sale. The place was 60 km away.
Reaching there and upon talking, he agreed to give us the wheels, but lend our wheels till he gets his wheels. Agreed and the wheels were mine.
He had this oversize wheels on his Eon. Checking his FB profile, he swaps wheels like every six months.
He made arrangements for swap at his friend's garage. Else we had to sweat at the roadside.
Trial install. Look and fit was good. Gold color wasn't as bad in real, but anyway will repaint.
All wheels on. Pays him. Leaves for the destination and picks the consignment and to home.
Had a blinding downpour, which washed the car real clean.
and finally home. 175 km total for the wheels.
One nut was stuck and had to be broken off to install the wheel. Drove with 3 nuts and it was constantly getting loose on the way back. Had to tighten it multiple times. Somehow reached home. Don't worry about the sick-looking red bolts. He gave it since stock nuts were not fitting properly with the alloy. It had Gladiator's like spades, which luckily lost from him. Would return the nuts when collecting my stock wheels back.