The first flow-formed wheels…ever - All about Forgestar Wheels

You hear the terms ‘flow-formed’, ‘flow-forged’, ‘rotary-forged’, ‘semi-forged’, and whatever other terms marketing departments decide to come up with. These all describe a wheel that's kinda forged, but not quite fully forged - and you hear them all over the place. But what do they actually mean? And more importantly, who were the pioneers of this revolutionary technology? If you’re unfamiliar with this concept, it’s similar to forging but not really, it is, however, close enough that companies can call it forging.

Before we can understand flow-forged wheels, we need to understand cast wheels

Casting involves heating metal up really really hot, pouring it into a mold that’s shaped like the wheel you want, then letting it solidify. This is a very cost effective way to produce wheels but results in a heavier and often weaker final product. This method is great for daily drivers or cars that see occasional track use. Drift spares, for example, are an excellent use for cast wheels.

Forged wheels sit on the other side of the spectrum

These are often very strong and can be made with less material, making them also very light - but it comes at a cost $$$. You start with a solid billet of aluminum, then compress it down into a rough shape with tons of heat and pressure. This improves the grain structure, the orientation of all the microscopic particles that make up the metal. Improved structure means the grain is more densely packed and has fewer air pockets.

Enter flow-forged wheels

These are the happy medium between inexpensive cast wheels and mega expensive forged wheels. They begin life a lot like a cast wheel with a center disk made of cast aluminum. The difference is that after the rough shape is cast, it’s put onto a spinning machine and extruded outward.

But why are we telling you all about rotary-forged wheels when the title reads “all about Forgestar wheels”

Forgestar was the first to do it

This might come as a surprise, but Forgestar was the first company to use this technology. Way back in 2007, Vincent Wong was an engineering student. He came to the realization that friends’ wheels sucked. At the time there were really two options 1) buy shitty-spec tire shop wheels and run a spacer. 2) spend a fortune on custom three piece wheels in the exact spec you want. Being an engineer, Vincent came up with a solution for an in-between product offering. He came up with the first customizable flow-formed wheel to be sold under the Forgestar brand. This was a first of its kind, before Forgestar your options were off-the-shelve cast wheels or made-to-order forged wheels.

Their customizable wheels were an instant hit. You could call them up and get a set of F14’s in whatever size, offset, and color you wanted. These things were super custom, but didn’t carry the bespoke wheel price tag. They remain a budget conscious option even to this day.

Forgestar’s unique offerings

At the time, they were the first to offer a 13J cast-ish wheel. They also made a super-deep concave option that simply didn’t exist with other wheel brands.

At this time we were coming out of the ‘dark ages’ of car production (early 2000’s), manufacturers were starting to pump out some bangers such as the W204 C63 AMG, E9x M3, the second-gen CTS-V, 997 Turbo, the list goes on and on. It just so happened that Forgestar made wheels that could be tailored to these cars. Naturally, Forgestar blew up in the early 2010’s when owners of these cars started looking for aftermarket wheels.

Up until this point Forgestar only had one model, the F14. But once their wheels started selling like hotcakes they rapidly expanded their product line. The CF5 is a nice, clean 5 spoke design; the CF10 is a 10 spoke (as you can probably deduce); and the CF5V is a dual-pane 5 spoke design.

D5 Drag wheels from Forgestar

Another big breakthrough was the D5 drag wheels. Up until this point, if you wanted a drag setup, or just a pair of rears so you can look like you race on TikTok, your only option was a big baller set of Weld Wheels. Forgestar changed the game again by bringing flow-forming tech to the drag world. They maintained the low cost while offering a light and durable wheel. As you can guess, they were an instant hit. This was the first time you could get flow-forged wheels with skinny fronts and wide-ass rears. To make it even better, they dropped a beadlock version of the D5 and their OG F14’s.

Merge with Weld Wheels

All this innovation caught the attention of Weld Wheels. They were acquired and merged into MW Company, along with ADV.1, MOMO, CCW, and a few others. Despite this, all these companies maintain their original branding.

Wrap up

Forgestar continues making some super cool wheels to this day. We can’t wait to see what they cook up next. Their design philosophy has always been ‘less is more’. Even today they make a total of maybe 13 different designs (less if you don’t count variants of other wheels, such as F14, F14C, and F14 Drag).

So what do you think? Would you run a set of Forgestar wheels on your car or truck? If you’re interested in picking up a set, we have the entire collection in our shop. We can get you a set of Forgestars wrapped in your choice of tire, delivered to your door in a few business days - no need to visit the tire shop!

Shop all Forgestar Wheels

If you have a set of Forgestar wheels, or any aftermarket wheels for that matter, be sure to add it to our Fitment Gallery - a place to share your build or get inspiration from other enthusiasts.