One of the most important aesthetic aspects of any vehicle on the road today is it's wheels. Many owners will quickly swap out the boring and drab factory steelies with hubcaps, or even the factory aluminum rims, to give them something unique, and set their ride apart from the rest.

In the aftermarket industry, a few different manufacturing techniques and finishing processes are used to create a huge variety of rims for any make and vehicle.

in the highest end of wheels, are the custom 3 piece wheels. These are extremely expensive, and serve as a symbol of somebody that has quite a bit of change to throw around. Most of these manufacturers make each set of wheels to order, and have none sitting on the shelf just waiting for delivery. With a turn around time of 4-6 weeks, sometimes longer, and no option of returning them once they're ordered, you best be sure you've picked what you really wanted. Furthermore, powder coating wheels, is an available option from almost all of these manufacturers and further sets that consumer apart from the off-the-shelf sets many people choose.

As you can see from the pictures above, you generally don't find these types of rims on your standard commuter car. With price ranges going from $6,000 with tires to well over $1,000,000 A SET for some with diamond studded spokes, they're generally out of reach for the common person to spend that type of money on.... but damn are they beautiful

All of the above examples are from an excellent high end company called Asanti.

Now getting into the more practical and reasonable wheels, we are confronted with a few companies like BBS, Konig, Enkei, and some other high profile rim manufacturers. BBS also plays alot in the 3 piece wheel market, but these are mainly for racing applications where strength, durability, and weight all play a huge factor. The 10 minute video above is amazing at showing you their process for making and powder coating wheels. These guys pay close attention to quality, but make the majority of their wheels in a 1 piece, forged design, unlike the manufacturers above. This keeps costs lower, but reduces the uniqueness of each set as they are a factory mold production piece, compared to a 1 off production. These are the types of wheels you see in your daily drives... unless you live in Miami or something like that.

These companies product amazing, lightweight, exceptionally strong wheels at a rather decent price. Most of these can be picked up for under $5k for an entire set of rims and tires, with many starting off in the $2k range.