HKS traces back to a 1973 startup near Mt. Fuji founded by ex-Yamaha engineer Hiroyuki Hasegawa. We trace its public filing history from turbo kits to a Tokyo Stock Exchange listing.
AME and KYOHO: Several Brands You Think Are Rivals Are One Company
AME, Shallen, Smack, Sein, Circlar, Steiner and Lowenhart are all one Nagoya company. KYOHO also wholesales dozens of other makers brands – and telling the two apart matters more than it sounds.
Desmond RegaMaster: The Revival Is Real, and They Will Tell You Who Forges It
The original RegaMaster really was discontinued, and the EVO II revival was redesigned by one of the original developers. Unusually for this series, Desmond names its forging partner and states its certification outright.
TRD Wheels: Who Actually Makes Them, and Why Nobody Will Tell You
Everyone says RAYS makes TRD wheels. TRD does not say it, and RAYS company materials do not mention TRD at all. Here is what is actually documented, including the December 2024 split that moved motorsport into a separate company.
Panasport: The Eight-Spoke That Is Not a Watanabe, and the Ownership Question We Could Not Settle
The practical test is construction: Panasport G7 eight-spokes are three-piece, classic Watanabes are one-piece castings. On the ownership question between Japan and the USA, we hit a wall and are saying so.
Spotting a Genuine RS Watanabe — and a Correction to Our Own Earlier Work
We told you RS Watanabe publishes no hub bore. They do – it is just organised by wheel model and PCD band rather than by vehicle. Here is the table, what the castings mean, and why an unmarked Watanabe is not automatically fake.
The Enkei RPF1: What MAT Actually Means, and What Enkei Does Not Claim
Enkei says plainly that cast and forged aluminium have the same stiffness and the same density – forging buys strength, not lightness. That honesty is the most useful thing on their engineering page. Also: no JWL claim, and no RPF2.
ADVAN Racing RG, RG-D, RGIII and RG-4: The Lineage, and the Word ADVAN Got Wrong in English
Every RG-family wheel is cast and flow-formed, not forged – ADVAN’s own English page mistranslates the RGIII. The D means deep rim. And ADVAN publishes neither a weight nor a load rating for any of them.
WORK vs RAYS vs BBS: Japan’s Big Three, Compared on What Actually Differs
BBS Japan makes nothing but forged wheels. RAYS is the only one that prints a load rating on every size. WORK is the multi-piece specialist. And at 18 inch the forged-versus-cast gap is bigger than any gap between the brands.
Volk Racing ZE40 vs TE37: The Comparison Nobody Sets Up Correctly
The wheel RAYS sells as plain TE37 today is 13 and 14 inch only. The one you are picturing is a derivative. And the kilogram figure on the spec sheet is a load rating, not a weight – which is why nobody can tell you which is lighter.