Cars, Coffee and California...

[oldgrayleather]

It turns out that installing one little safety mod in the Sunburst (harddog deuce) was enough to break the seal for Mrs. R to start considering other potential "enhancements". She expressed a little interest in wheels specifically and said she'd love a beautiful set of StarSharks (good taste and all but really?! It took years to find the first set in 4x100). For some reason she'd decided that white would really complement the yellow paint (gold not so much and black/ gunmetal was too "serious". White and silver sharks never existed to my knowledge but I couldn’t argue they wouldn’t look nice). She also appreciated the simplicity of Bridgestone SuperRaps so I showed her another modern option that was similar in style. I'd shared this with Vu (a fellow Roadster nut with an exquisite white NB) who noted he'd picked up a set of the aforementioned wheels a year ago and had still never mounted them. He also said we should test drive them for a while, like until summer. This wasn’t even the kind of soft sell “try them, you’ll like them, then you can buy them” ploy you might be thinking. In fact Vu was very clear he was not prepared to part with them. He liked having them in his collection alongside the 15’s (MTE37, RS8’s and Equip 40’s). This was Vu just being a huge hearted individual. I've said it a thousand times before but the kindness found in this Roadster community never ceased to amaze me!

So a couple days ago, Vu drove the 25 miles up to our house with the wheels in the back of his car and while we caught up with masks on he mentioned his afternoon plans had changes and that we should get the wheels on. The first three went on with little effort but the security bolt on the last daisy broke (I know, who really felt that these wheels needed the extra security measured back in the day?!).



That ensured the last wheel was going nowhere. I again thanked Vu for his generosity, asked for reassurances he really was down with this and off he went on his way while I spent the next couple hours trying zip ties, vice grips, hose clamps, et al to remove that one last bolt before I conceded and drove it to our neighborhood alignment place. They were swamped but promised it the next day so went around to collect.

I think the CMC O3’s in Sandy Silver (shod in brand new Azenis) really complement the Sunburst. Mrs. R still thinks they would look better in white but we’ll see. 14x7 (+20) is such a great OEM+ fitment and I love seeing the wheel wells more suitably filled. It does partly emphasize the opportunity to address the right height…