My Forgiato EV001 Headache

[smoke20]

This post is part therapy (for me) and part 'heads up' to any prospective Forgiato wheel owners. Two weeks ago I saw and became smitten by Forgiato EV001 wheels. They had me at hello. These are 20x9 with a +35 offset which pushes them out nicely. My car is only 3 weeks old so I transferred the OE tires. The wheels arrived and were immediate taken to Solo Performance in St Louis for the tire swap. Everything was great for about 4 days until I realized I was missing an aero insert. Gone! It seems like the factory did not correctly torque it down (it is held by a screw from the backside of the wheel). Over the past several days I have bounced back and forth between Forgiato and their dealer. Nobody seems to care. I paid my $2,000 entry fee and all is good. No, it is not. How about some customer service. Forgiato will not talk to anybody but a dealer. The dealer tells me Forgiato is not responsive. Forgiato then says they ARE responsive. It would be great if somebody would simply send me a free replacement. This is not my fault. I paid $2,000. Their defective workmanship is not my problem. But they do not seem to care. This is a piece of injection molded plastic that has a cost of maybe $0.45. Why not just send me a replacement? If I was a repeat offender, maybe not. But I am not. I just bought these. Nobody cares. It puzzles me. They want to sell me one plastic areo insert replacement for $125 shipped. The principle of this stings.

I purchased my first set of aftermarket wheels in 1987; yep, back then Tire Rack had a 1/2 page ad in Car and Driver. I have been a Tire Rack and Discount Tire Direct customer for a long long time. They have never let me down. I went down the wrong path with this latest purchase. My bad.

This story does not involve forum sponsor Vibe Motorsports. I did reach out to them and they were kind and did offer to sell me a replacement aero insert. I could not do it. This is a plastic part that should be covered under warranty. The cost would have been 1/4 of what I just paid to buy an entire new EV001 wheel. Yep, I just a bought a new wheel in order to get a replacement insert...and I will have extras for when something else happens. I sure hope this new forgiato dealer delivers the wheel. Next time, Tire Rack. Forgiato - never again.

Im still annoyed, but this post helps a little bit. Thank you.

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[Scooby24]

I agree with you in that there should probably be a better resolution that's offered to you, but by turning over the wheels to an installer, can you say with 100% certainty they didn't loosen the bolts or remove the inserts when they mounted the tires, and failed to install them torqued well? Are you certain that fastener was never touched to the point it's absolutely without question a problem with the manufacturer? Is it reasonable to assume the inserts would be fastened with holding torque from the factory? I would personally not make that assumption and I would have checked their torque myself.

In the end though, you're right...it's cheap and an exception should probably be made to get you a replacement with instruction for the tire shop to check the torque on the other wheels.

 

[smoke20]

Moral of the story; check all aero inserts right out of the box on these wheels. This being said, I have not checked torque on any fastener in my 4 week old MME....including the fasteners that attach the steering wheel...LOL, if you know my reference. Legally speaking, a reasonable person would not expect to be required to check torque on any new product unless there was a clear disclaimer saying so. But, there is clearly a difference between what you should expect to have to do and what you should do.

Just to 'run the ball through the end zone' of my story, I took the new wheels in their shipping boxes to Solo Performance for installation. Dave (owner) guided me into the garage and up onto the elevated ramps for the lift. However, I ended up backing down off the lift and we hand jacked the car due to the incompatibility of the lift. I brought a small modified section of 2x4 to better match the floor jack to the jacking points on the car. I was in the garage for the entire 60 minutes; areo inserts were never touched...nor was the edge of the rim. Solo Performance is the only shop that has never put a mark on any of my wheels during mount / dismount. My luck with the typical tire shops in town has not been good over the years.

So, my assumption is that this aero insert was either not fully screwed in or the threaded insert (assuming these use inserts in order to accept machine screws) failed allowing the aero wing to come loose. I will never know because the aero insert is MIA.

The sting is wearing off today; I am feeling better. This is good therapy.

 

[RickMachE]

I wouldn't spend that kind of money on wheels, but I can guarantee I would be hounding all parties daily to get that insert.

Good on you to post this for others, because that clearly is not a good situation.

 

[Discount Tire]

Hello smoke20. I'm sorry to hear that you are having issues with your new wheels.
Sending a DM your way...

 

[smoke20]

Here is the latest. I ordered a new Forgiato EV001 from Wheels Below Retail because they were one of the only places I could find that would sell single wheels; and their website indicated they had 2 in stock. After 24 hrs I attempted to reach them to see when it would ship. I got voicemail after voicemail and the mailbox was full and would not accept any messages. Nobody answers. I tried the on-line chat; it responded by asking for my cell phone so they could call me back. No call back. I emailed their sales department and got a response they were helping others and to text or call them at XXX-XXX-XXXX. Round and round we go. The hold for $450 was on my credit card. I called again and Sergio indicated those wheels were sold out and discontinued. He offered to check other warehouses and wanted me to call back. Next day he called me and said he was still looking. He said he might be able to take another wheel and drill it out; "stop, no...we are not going there." I am, trying to cancel the order and get my money back; this might be a job for Chase. Nothing so far.
The charge has now gone through. Looks like another professional Forgiato dealer.

My frustration boiled over and I left a new eBay review for the original seller as well as Forgiato. That seemed to get some attention. All I did was tell the truth. The original dealer then contacted Forgiato and Forgiato gave them a quote for a replacement part. I received a text from the dealer; "I have a quote from Forgiato." I asked for how much? One other dealer offered to sell me the piece for $105. The original dealer showed me his cost of $55 and said he would eat it. Still angry at Forgiato I told him Forgiato should not be charging anybody anything for a piece of plastic that fell of the wheel after 3 days. Come on. Dealer agreed but did not want the blemish on his eBay store front. I took him up on the offer and will revisit the eBay review when I receive the part.

Since then I received a very nice DM on this forum from Discount Tire. I want to add that although I mentioned being a customer of Tire Rack since 1987, I should also lump Discount Tire Direct into that echelon of tire/wheel distributors as I have gone back and forth for the past 36 years.

 

[Discount Tire]

Here is the latest. I ordered a new Forgiato EV001 from Wheels Below Retail because they were one of the only places I could find that would sell single wheels; and their website indicated they had 2 in stock. After 24 hrs I attempted to reach them to see when it would ship. I got voicemail after voicemail and the mailbox was full and would not accept any messages. Nobody answers. I tried the on-line chat; it responded by asking for my cell phone so they could call me back. No call back. I emailed their sales department and got a response they were helping others and to text or call them at XXX-XXX-XXXX. Round and round we go. The hold for $450 was on my credit card. I called again and Sergio indicated those wheels were sold out and discontinued. He offered to check other warehouses and wanted me to call back. Next day he called me and said he was still looking. He said he might be able to take another wheel and drill it out; "stop, no...we are not going there." I am, trying to cancel the order and get my money back; this might be a job for Chase. Nothing so far.
The charge has now gone through. Looks like another professional Forgiato dealer.

My frustration boiled over and I left a new eBay review for the original seller as well as Forgiato. That seemed to get some attention. All I did was tell the truth. The original dealer then contacted Forgiato and Forgiato gave them a quote for a replacement part. I received a text from the dealer; "I have a quote from Forgiato." I asked for how much? One other dealer offered to sell me the piece for $105. The original dealer showed me his cost of $55 and said he would eat it. Still angry at Forgiato I told him Forgiato should not be charging anybody anything for a piece of plastic that fell of the wheel after 3 days. Come on. Dealer agreed but did not want the blemish on his eBay store front. I took him up on the offer and will revisit the eBay review when I receive the part.

Since then I received a very nice DM on this forum from Discount Tire. I want to add that although I mentioned being a customer of Tire Rack since 1987, I should also lump Discount Tire Direct into that echelon of tire/wheel distributors as I have gone back and forth for the past 36 years.

@smoke20 Thank you for the kind words. We are here to help!

 

[smoke20]

All fixed! The insert arrived today. Wheels Below Retail refunded my money for the replacement wheel they could not get....and our forum sponsor, Discount Tire, is getting my tire business. Appreciate Joe.

 

[kindofblue]

All fixed! The insert arrived today. Wheels Below Retail refunded my money for the replacement wheel they could not get....and our forum sponsor, Discount Tire, is getting my tire business. Appreciate Joe.

Got pics with the insert?

 

[MachKet]

Yeah post some pics, these look slick

 

[smoke20]

I will take a beauty shot this weekend after the rainy week passes. Hopefully the inserts stay!

"EV Range Anxiety??.....I now have Insert Anxiety!!"

 

[AZBill]

I would put blue Loctite on all the screws, to keep this from happening again

 

[smoke20]

I would put blue Loctite on all the screws, to keep this from happening again

I used the 'Blue' on the one I just installed and I did not go Hulk on the torque. I originally thought the screw was loose; but now I am thinking the factory may have overtightened the screw and damaged the threaded insert within the plastic wing. The correct thing to do would be to put the radio on in the garage, pull each wheel, remove each screw and reinstall each screw with Blue at a reasonable torque.

 

[RickMachE]

I will take a beauty shot this weekend after the rainy week passes. Hopefully the inserts stay!

"EV Range Anxiety??.....I now have Insert Anxiety!!"

Please, this is a family-rated forum.

 

[Logal727]

really wanna see what these look like on the car, itching for some wider wheels/tires on my 4X

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