These three innovative wheel locking systems will have thieves scratching their heads.

If you have customers with fancy aftermarket or OEM rims, chances are they have already invested in a set of wheel locks to prevent the bad guys from jacking up their cars and stealing their rims. Unfortunately, wheel locks are old news, and thieves have long figured out ways to remove them with the help of a few simple tools from the local hardware store.

Well aware of this challenge, a number of wheel lock companies have developed solutions that are sure to perplex the average thief, and hopefully have them moving on to easier targets.

Advanced Wheel Locks

One of these companies is U.S.-based Advanced Wheel Locks (www.advancedlocks.com). Liz Lambert is one of the co-owners of the company. She and here husband John were determined to outwit thieves who would easily remove traditional wheel locks with a few simple tools. “You can take a 12-point socket that’s slightly smaller than the lug, pound it over the top of the lock, and get it off in seconds,” she says. “So they’re completely ineffective, and everybody knows it.”

Her husband, a mechanical engineer by trade, decided that he had to come up with a design for a wheel lock that could not be tampered with. “So he designed our patented conical shape, which he worked on for several years to refine, and get the metallurgy right so that it’s too hard a material that you can’t simply pound anything on it in order to grab it and turn it,” Lambert explains.

The fact that the lock is shaped like a cone means that there is no flat surface for a bit or a wrench to grab on to. In addition, the notches are spaced carefully so that no two are directly across from each other. This means a thief can’t use a set of pliers or channel grips to grab on and twist the wheel lock off.

Lambert and her partners don’t do any advertising, she says. The product has become very successful, just from word-of-mouth advertising. Advanced Wheel Locks is also happy to work with retailers. “We actually custom engineer patterns for retailers, so that they can carry something that only their customers would have access to, with keys specifically made for them,” Lambert adds.

Rimgard

Another company that’s coming up with innovate ways to frustrate thieves is Rimgard (www.rimgard.com). Based in Sweden, they sell their wheel locks to companies and consumers around the globe.

Rimgard offers two anti-theft solutions, aptly named Rimgard Original and Rimgard ONE. The former is designed as a lug nut cover that’s installed in the centre of the wheel in order to eliminate access to the lugs, while the latter is a lockable bolt positioned inside a rotating cylinder housing.

If it sounds complicated, it is, and that’s good news because you want the thief to look at either lock and wonder how to bypass the security—or ideally, decide it’s not worth the hassle and move on. For a better idea of how these locks work, Rimgard has demo videos on their website.

Like the name implies, Rimgard Original is the company’s original solution. This locking system has been available since 2019. Rimgard ONE is more of a traditional solution, made up of a bold that’s fastened with a torx adapter and then sealed with a locked cylinder that has an exterior that spins freely so that it can’t be gripped by any tool, and used to unscrew the bolt.

“It has 66,000 combinations, and you don’t stand a chance to be able to get it out,” says Fredrick Tallroth, Chief Marketing Officer at Rimgard. “It’s very solid.”

The Original comes with five or six arms, which cover the lugs, and is very vehicle-specific. “We design and manufacturer the locks based on the make, and sometimes even down to the specific model of the vehicle,” Tallroth explains. “It’s not a once-size-fits-all solution. Different vehicles will have different bolt patterns, different wheel designs with concave or convex patterns, so we need to make sure there’s a good fit so you cannot pry the lock off with a crowbar or attack it with an angle grinder. It’s designed to create a tight fit.”

Rimgard ONE, on the other hand is more universal. It’s currently available for numerous makes and models that employ bolts rather than lug nuts to attach the wheels.

The metal was specifically designed not to be too hard or too soft, Tallroth explains. If it’s too soft, the thief can pound it with a tool and get a grip. “If it’s too hard, it will be sensitive to freeze spray and can break,” he adds.

Working with dealerships and OEMs

Rimgard is currently working with a few dealerships who order directly from them in order to protect their own inventory. Tallroth says Rimgard would be happy to sell to retailers here in Canada, but that the company isn’t set up yet for large wholesale operations.

“We sell the Rimgard ONE in large quantities to one OEM in particular as an accessory,” he adds. “So it’s selling in larger volumes here in Europe. The Rimgard Original is sold in large volumes to Slovakia where the Land Rover Defender is built, as well as to the distribution centre for accessories in the U.K., from where Land Rover sources all spare parts and all accessories for their vehicles worldwide.”

While it’s true that determined thieves can steal almost anything they set their sights on, innovative locks like these are superior to the conventional wheel locks that have been around for so long that they no longer present a serious challenge to the bad guys. These products, on the other hand, offer added peace-of-mind for your customers, while giving thieves a good reason to move on to an easier target.