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 efore
there were Harley-Davidsons—even before there were motorcycles
at all—there was the wheel. There aren’t a lot of ways to
improve on the basic design of the wheel, but when it comes to style,
that’s a different story. Two of the newest styles on the market,
the Tazor and the Thrasher, both from Carriage Works, are now available
exclusively through Drag Specialties.While all wheels look more or less the same—which is to say round—Carriage Works wheels are made differently from most. Instead of being cast in a mold, they’re forged from solid billet. “We started the forged-wheel motorcycle industry eight years ago. We were the first ones to produce a forged wheel,” says Steve Mayer of Carriage works. “Now everyone is doing something similar so we must have been on the right track.” A forged Carriage Works wheel starts with a “log” of aluminum forging material. A slice is cut off of the log and pre-heated, then placed into a forging die. Each of the nine different sizes of Carriage works wheels has its own forging die—and the dies aren’t cheap. The slice is put into the die and spun and squeezed into the shape of the wheel. “Some of the sizes take as much as 10 million pounds of pressure to forge them into shape,” says Mayer. “What you get is what we call a radial grain flow, which is what gives the forging its strength over a piece of billet or a casting.” At this point the wheel is still rough, so it’s CNC-machined into its finished form, with the CNC process ensuring precise wheel trueness. The final step is chroming. First the raw wheel is polished in-house to a mirror finish. Carriage Works uses only hexavalent chrome plating, applied by the same plater that does many parts for Harley-Davidson. The plater uses the same color and brilliance as the chrome Harley-Davidson uses, to make sure Carriage Works wheels match the stock chrome parts. The plater’s work is tested periodically, too, by subjecting it to a CASS (copper-accelerated salt spray) test to ensure corrosion-resistance. All Carriage Works wheels are tubeless, and come ready to bolt on. Wheels for 1999-and-earlier applications come with tapered bearings and races already installed, and with the end play set. Wheels for 2000-and-later models come with sealed ball bearings. Nine sizes are available: 16x3.25; 18x3.25; 18x4; 18x5.5; 18x8.5; 18x10.5; 19x2.15; 21x2.15; and 21x3.5. Carriage Works also makes a full line of pulleys to match its wheels. Like the wheels, they’re forged, not cast, and come in nine sizes for 1999-and-earlier and 2000-and-later models. Matching brake rotors in 410 stainless steel are also available. Reinventing the wheel is a tough job. Revolutionizing the way wheels are made wasn’t easy, either—but Carriage Works did it.  |
The new Tazor wheel from Carriage Works is, like all Carriage Works wheels,
forged from solid billet, instead of being cast in a mold. 
For more
information see:
www.carriageworksinc.com
