There is often a lot of confusion for people when it comes to chrome wheels. When people go shopping for a car at the dealership they usually assume that whatever they purchase came straight from the factory. That isn’t always the case! Many dealers will actually do some custom upgrades of their own to increase the desirability of a vehicle. One very common thing done by dealers to achieve this upgraded status is to chrome the factory wheels. This way the car is still all “OEM” but looks a bit classier than its competition.
Factory BMW Wheel with Aftermarket Chrome
Here is an example of a 528i BMW wheel that you often see in chrome on cars, even on the lot. However, this wheel did not actually come factory chrome from BMW, it actually came in a standard BMW painted silver finish. When people order this chrome BMW wheel they have to specify to us that theirs is actually chrome and not the original finish.
When customers call places like us, OriginalWheels.com, they get confused because as far as they know the car is all original; they never went and got their wheels chromed aftermarket. They don’t realize that their fancy chrome rims actually used to be painted silver or machined from the factory. This causes confusion when we tell them that their wheel was not made in chrome because clearly their car came with chrome rims. These people need not fear though! Just about all alloy rims can be chromed with an aftermarket chrome just like what the dealer did, it will just cost a bit extra.
What gets extra confusing however is that some wheels do actually come chrome from the factory. These wheels can be ordered directly from the manufacturer in chrome and do not require to be chromed after purchase.
Although this is all very confusing, we hope that it has been insightful in helping you identify your wheels.
