It is the wishes of customers and the requirements in our own aftermarket program that significantly decide which of the latest trends will be taken up by our creative teams of designers. In keeping with our philosophy of lessons learned, the design process not only incorporates the requirements of our customers, but also the specialist skills and expertise of all departments.
Every year we produce some 200 new wheels for virtually all major automobile brands. The design wishes come directly from our customers. In the development process we then have to realize these designs 1:1 as far as possible. How feasible this is depends on the actual producibility, subject to criteria such as strength, clearance, castability etc., and sometimes involves major costs. Development is above all influenced by demands to do with weight and styling, but properties such as natural frequency, rigidity or aerodynamics are also becoming increasingly important. The trend is currently towards a need for higher load limits, as passenger cars are becoming heavier. We are also increasingly seeing a move towards customizing surface finishes, combining colors and mixing materials.
Each year we additionally realize numerous developments of our own to extend our aftermarket range. The RONAL design team, consisting of several employees from different departments, goes through the many preliminary designs using vehicle animations, shortlisting 1-3 designs for the creation of styling models. The new design line is then approved during the final selection process, which also involves asking the opinion of our aftermarket country representatives, and it then goes into production, possibly in more than one wheel size. The final choice is greatly influenced by current market trends, as well as the vehicle categories and models to be taken into consideration. Trends are increasingly focusing on varied surface finishes here too, in addition to asymmetric spoke design.