Spoke types on Borranis for 330 GTC - steel or stainless?

Yesterday I took my Borrani wheels (tires still mounted) to Buchanan's Spoke and Wheel in Azusa, CA. I wanted to be sure the spokes were true and safe. The wheels were inspected by Robert, who is the owner of the company.

All wheels were true and the spokes were tight. Curiously, using a magnet Robert found that 3 of the wheels had all stainless steel spokes. The fourth wheel had stainless spokes on the inside, while the outer 2 rows had steel spokes. The wheel was true, so someone did a good job to rework this wheel.

So did Borranis come from the factory with stainless steel spokes? Or in my story, the 3 wheels with all stainless were reworked?

(Aside: Robert gave me a quick tour of his plant. They make spokes for all type of vehicles. Wheels are really not the focus of the company. He showed me a set of wheels for an antique Rolls Royce Phantom that they had reworked with new spokes.)

 

Unless your car is a competition car that had painted Borranis the spokes would have been chromed steel from the factory.

Good info on Borranis in thread here.

 

Thanks, Steven. These are chrome Borranis. From what you're saying, the 3 wheels have been reworked with the stainless spokes. Weird. I know that stainless does stretch a little. So maybe I need to tone down the cornering forces a little. Whoever did the work did a good job as there was undetectable runout on all wheels.

 

Jim: Stainless spokes usually do not stretch. They are more brittle than plain steel, so they break. For a spoke, stretching is not all bad. We use steel spokes ONLY on the vintage race cars, and still routinely break spokes.

 

Jim, glad to see that you are driving it “like you stole it!” The previous owner certainly didn’t so good to hear it’s in good hands and being used as Enzo intended!

 

As well as making our own Turrino brand alloy rim wire wheels in the UK our company has also rebuilt, serviced and sometimes upgraded several thousand Borrani wheels for road and competition cars over the last 20 years, the last 11 years in my ownership.
The issue about stainless spokes is an interesting one and I can comment from very real experience.
Many of our customers are Ferrari race specialists who use us exclusively for their Borrani rebuilds and also often use Turrinos for their race & road wheels.

I understand that some early stainless spokes were made of an inferior grade to the 304 now universally used and that they did suffer quite a few failures. I believe this is the source of occasionally heard negative stories about the performance of stainless spokes.
Our experience is that good 304 stainless spokes are certainly not inferior to modern chromed steel spokes and possibly superior though we haven't collected serious data which could be statistically analysed. I mention 'modern' chromed spokes as these are generally superior to the period versions which I don't believe were always plated in such a way as to avoid hydrogen embrittlement of the steel.
We recommend using painted carbon steel spokes for competition use as this was how it was in period but we have many customers racing on polished stainless spokes without any problems.
Some wheel configurations have less than ideal spoke numbers and angles and and we do see occasional spoke failures in these cases but it's a very rare occurrence with a good design properly built.
The main cause of spoke failure we see is where the spoke drilling in the rim hasn't been done at the correct angle. The spoke nipple then emerges from the rim at the wrong angle and causes the spoke to bend when the nipple is tensioned. This then puts extra strain on the spoke which fails either where it enters the nipple or at the bend on the other end or the spoke head itself can shear off. This applies equally of course to carbon and stainless steel spokes. If you see bent spokes in your wheels I'd suggest getting them sorted out.
Spoke failure is also caused by unequal tension which could be caused by rim distortion after kerbing or accident, or insufficient tension in the original build.
We can overcome the incorrect spoke drilling angles easily enough by re-cutting the nipple seats, and some of the less perfect spoke lacing designs by fitting spokes with thicker butts at the wheel centre ends.
The last set of Borranis I bought for myself before acquiring Turrino Wheels were special order 8 x 15's which I specified to have carbon steel spokes, painted for competition use. They were nice looking wheels but after 2 or three years the paint chipped off a couple of spokes which then revealed themselves to be chromed steel that the naughty Italians had painted over. So watch out...

I would also like to add that we have a had a great relationship with Buchanan Spokes from whom we source some of the thicker gauge spokes not easy to source in Europe. We have also used them to help out with wheel adjustments for some of our US customers and can highly recommend them.

 

I would like to chime in here.
As many of you know, my 330 GTC is my daily driver.
It came equipped with the factory Borranis made with chromed steel spokes.
The wheels were on the car for around 170,000 miles, including around 5,000 miles on the track.
From new, the spokes were never adjusted or tightened and there was never any sign of runout.
Last year, I sent them to Brightworks for total reconditioning.
There were no issues other than cosmetics - nicks and dents from the original owner and rust on the spokes.
When they came back, they were/are PERFECT.
Once I convert them to tubeless, I will install another set of Uniroyal whitewalls.
For now, I'm driving the car with Campagnolo alloy wheels which I reconditioned.
I should mention that the car was driven as it was meant to be - not hard but very spirited.

Bob Z.

 

I just noticed I mentioned that I said Buchanan help us out with wheel adjustments whereas I should have said Brightworks. A great company I highly recommend too. We do buy spokes from Buchanan, also good.

 

Hi

We are the UK Borrani distributers https://www.borrani.com/

We deal with sales and rebuilding. When we have Borranis rebuilt they are shipped back to Milano where they are rebuilt in the factory.

There are Borrani Distributers in the States. Can i sytrongly encourage you to have them rebuilt by the proper Borrani distributer. The list is on here https://www.ruoteborrani.com/en/wire-wheels-for-automobiles/classic/distributors/

It is going to cost to have them done, so why not have them doen properly with proper Borrani components.

Borrani will not use stainless steel spokes because it is the wrong material to make spokes out of.

don't mess about have them done properly, that way they are still a Borrani.

 

Hi Dougal,

I got your message too late to get the tires from you, as I had already ordered the 2 205/70VR14 tires locally. I have 14x61/2 RW 3874 wheels. Tom Yang's data show this to be the correct wheel for the 330 GTC.

My wheels have metal valve stems. While the new tires were mounted, I found that clear silicone sealer had been put around the spokes so that a tube was not required. The wheels don't leak, but I don't know if there will be high speed issues.

Dougal, not really in a position to spend big bucks on getting the wheels back to "original." I will reach out to Robert at Buchanan's to see what he would charge.

Edit: From Robert: using chrome steel spokes, rebuild of all 4 wheels would be about $4,800. Robert said that sometimes the chroming of the spokes makes them more brittle. His recommendation: it ain't broke, don't fix it.

 

72 spoke RW 4039 7" x 14" wheels and full profile 205 x VR14" tyres are correct for the 330 GTC.

60 spoke RW 3874 wheels and 205 /70 VR 14" tyres are incorrect.

 

Hi Steven,

I know that the correct tire is the 205VR14. But I couldn't get the tires in time for the event I'm planning, and the 205/70VR14 tires are working for me.

From Tom Yang's table of wheel sizes:
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

^^^ The only correct wheel in the above table is the RW 3874 for the 275 GTS.

 

Tom is a good friend, but that website is wrong. ALL three lines you listed in your post are incorrect. Don't believe everything you see on the internet.

 

Ok, so I’m back to thinking that someone rebuilt some trashed 275 wheels and swapped them out for the wheels that should have been on my 330 GTC.

 

Your car may have originally had the Campagnolo 7" × 14" alloy wheels which a previous owner replaced with the RW 3874s which are correct for short nose 275 GTB and 275 GTS. May we ask the chassis number of your car?

 

9857

 

Thanks. Interesting ownership history. Sold new with Borranis. Is the spare wheel a RW 4039 or a RW 3847?

 

Spare is also 3874 (right, 74!) with new 205/70VR14. But it has chrome steel spokes. It also has a small curb dent in the rim.

 

Stating the obvious, your wheels obviously have value, and you could sell them and buy some correct RW4039s, if you so wished of course.

 

Thanks, Steven. I have thought exactly that. Right now I'll see how my driving goes through the summer. The car does need paint, which I had planned to do by now but I've postponed that until next winter.

 

Seems you have the build sheet for 9857? Would it be possible to get a copy?

 

I'm sorry, Jim. I don't have the build sheets. The info that I found was in the previous posted adverts for the car when it was sold by Gooding in 2006 and doing a search of 09857 on this site.

 

I hope this cheesey film i made ages ago shows the difference between a 205VR14 and the 205/70VR14



there is 42mm difference in overall diameter. (25.4mm in an inch) that is a lot.

Borrani suggest both wheels for a GTC

https://www.borrani.com/ferrari-wheels/330-gtc.html

Are we confident in saying that 330GTC did not fit RW3874? or do you think Ferrari might have used both?