The TE37 is the most copied Japanese wheel of the last thirty years, and the most misnamed. Those two facts are related: you cannot authenticate a wheel if you do not know which wheel it is supposed to be.
So this article does both. What the suffixes mean, then how to tell a real one.
The Short Version
- The name is a weight. The original TE37 launched in 1996 as a 15-inch wheel weighing 3.7 kg. RAYS says on its own site that is where the 37 comes from.
- All of them are forged. Including the SL — the claim that “SL is not really forged” is wrong.
- SL means Super Lap. Machined lighter, roughly 400 g saved on an 18×10.5 benchmark.
- V means Vintage — a deeper dish for older, narrower-track Japanese cars.
- The best fake tell is the lug holes. On a genuine wheel they sit at an angle to the spokes. On many fakes they line up.
The Family
| Model | What it is |
|---|---|
| TE37 | 1996. Forged one-piece. 15 inch, 3.7 kg — the origin of the name |
| TE37 MAG | 1998. Forged magnesium, Magnesium Blue only |
| TE37 Gravel | 1999. Reinforced for rally use |
| TE37SL | Early 2000s. Super Lap — spoke backs and centre machined lighter. No centre caps without an adapter ring. Red decals |
| LE37 / Tokyo Time Attack | Diamond-cut lip limited editions |
| TE37 Large P.C.D. | SUV and off-road fitments; later revised as Progressive |
| TE37V / V Mark-II | Vintage. Deep dish for older narrow-track JDM cars, 14 to 18 inch |
| TE37 Saga | 2017, after a stated twelve-month development and a new mould |
| TE37 Ultra | TE37 spoke design, SL machining technique, TE37RT barrel construction |
The two that matter most in the used market are SL and V, and they pull in opposite directions. SL is lighter for track use. V is deeper-dished for cars built when 14 inches was a big wheel. They are not upgrades of each other.
The SL Myth, Corrected
You will read that the TE37SL is not a true forged wheel — that it is somehow a lesser process to hit the price.
That is wrong. The SL uses the same mould-form forging as the standard TE37. What differs is machining: material is removed from the spoke backs and the centre after forging. It is a lighter wheel because metal was taken away, not because it was made differently.
The saving is roughly 400 g per wheel against a standard TE37, benchmarked on 18×10.5. That figure originates with RAYS and is repeated by retailers; we did not find it on a RAYS specification sheet, so treat it as manufacturer-claimed rather than independently measured.
The visible consequences: SL wheels cannot take standard centre caps without an adapter ring, and they carry red decals.
Telling a Real One
RAYS published a counterfeit and unauthorised-product warning dated 19 June 2026. We can confirm the notice exists and its date; its body text is embedded as an image, so we are not going to paraphrase words we could not read.
What owners consistently report:
| Check | Genuine | Fake |
|---|---|---|
| Lug hole position | Holes sit at an angle to the spokes | Holes line up directly with spokes and valve |
| Stamp | RAYS and MADE IN JAPAN engraved |
Often just JAPAN |
| Bronze finish | Machined, glossy anodised lip against a matte centre | Uniform grainy texture across the whole face |
| Spoke to barrel | Gradual transition | Sharper, more abrupt angle |
| Stickers | — | Prove nothing. Trivially reproduced |
The lug hole check is the good one. It is geometric, it does not depend on finish or lighting, and it is visible in almost any photograph of the face.
The Check Nobody Mentions: Does the Spec Exist?
This one is clever and comes from an owner forum.
A genuine 18×9 TE37SL is offered at +45, and not at +22. So a listing offering an 18×9 SL at +22 for an Evo X — a combination RAYS never catalogued, in part because of big-brake clearance — is describing a wheel that does not exist.
Cross-check the claimed size, offset and application against what RAYS actually made. A counterfeiter copying a face does not necessarily copy a catalogue.
On Weight as a Test
Weight is the first thing everyone reaches for, and on this model it is weaker than you would hope.
Two retailers listing the same TE37SL in 15×8 +32 quote 11.65 lb and 11.3 lb. That is 160 grams of disagreement between sellers who both think they are right.
So weight will catch a cast copy of a forged wheel, which is a large difference. It will not settle a marginal case. We go into this more in the cross-brand guide.
On Certification
RAYS’ own product page for the TE37 lists the safety standard as JWL+R Spec 2 — a racing-oriented specification beyond baseline JWL — for that particular listing.
We could not confirm that every street-size TE37 also carries VIA, so we are not going to tell you it does. Check the wheel.
What We Could Not Verify
- A RAYS-published weight for a standard TE37 in any size, for a like-for-like comparison against the SL. Retailer figures disagree with each other.
- The text of the June 2026 counterfeit notice. It is an image.
- Whether
VIAappears on all street TE37 variants, as distinct fromJWL+R. - The 400 g SL saving as an independently measured figure. Manufacturer-claimed, retailer-repeated.
Related Guides
- How to spot a fake JDM wheel — the method behind all of this
- RAYS brand profile — a company history told in forging presses
- Real or fake WORK wheels
- NISMO — whose LM GT4 sits on the same retailer list as RAYS
Before You Buy
Send us the size, the offset and the claimed application, and photographs of the face and the back. Half the fakes we see are caught by the catalogue check before anyone even looks at the metal. The Request page reaches us.