Ling Ling gets a new pair of shoes

I've been waiting til I got some pics to post to plug BigWheels.net.

The owner of BigWheels.net is a racer. Knowing this, it wasn't too hard to guilt him into sponsoring us for the race.

In true big wheels style, we ordered a set of 24" chrome wheels for Ling Ling. No, not spinners. Those are cheezy. Our bling must be done tastefully. Back to the 24's. Sure, they weigh 50lbs each. Yes, mounting will require substantial amounts of fabrication. Yeah, each tire will cost more than our entire car. But it'll all be worth it when you see these rims.

Then we heard about the Alamo City Rollers from LeMons Texas. They had big wheels too:

It's been done.

Order cancelled. Back to the drawing board.

Boring as it is, for the race we opted to just get tires and run the cheap wheels we have. 1 set of bottlecaps and some less boring (and almost as cheap, thanks Ramon!) basketweaves as our 2nd set. We picked Falken Azenis RT-615s in 195/60/14 due to their relatively high grip and relative low cost.

So we ordered our tires from BigWheels and used that set for the shakedown days. Prior to the first shakedown, I showed up at BigWheels with an assortment of 7 bottlecap wheels with tires. Of the 7 wheels, 4 were straight (2 of which came with Ling Ling). Of the 7 tires, 3 were keepers. Of course, they were all mixed up. I rattled off some complicated instructions about what to keep, and was pleased when I returned and everything was done right.

And today I picked up the 2nd set of tires for the race. They go on the bottlecaps:

The wheels weren't black originally, but that was easily fixed with some of our favorite appliance enamel in a can. I'm thinking about buying stock in Rust Oleum. In today's tough economic times, appliance enamel can make a difference.

Ah, and while I'm posting, here's another shot of the car with the nose and grills in, plus a nice garden edging front spoiler:

I wish I could roll the clock forward 3 days, the race can't come soon enough.