Beadlock Wheels: what they are & why off-roaders use them

What are beadlock wheels? Learn how they work and why off-roaders use them.

The problem

You’re driving on sand on low tyre pressures, turn the wheel, give it some jandal and all of a sudden you hear a pop-fwump-fwump-fwump noise. As you pull to a stop, you close your eyes and swear and pray to the off-roading gods that you haven’t just done what you think you’ve just done.

We’ve all been there, and yep, that was a bead you just rolled.

A quick explanation

In case you’re unaware, the inner edges of a tyre are called beads, and they’re held onto the rims by a raised lip on the inner surface of the wheel. The tyre bead sits up against the edge of the rim and holds air.

The problem arises when you let your tyres down a bit too far and the air pressure is not high enough to securely keep the bead up against the metal. Throw in some high-leverage manoeuvring (like cornering), and it’s not uncommon for the bead to roll off the lip of the wheel, leaving you with a minor headache and 0 psi.

The quick fix

The good news is that it’s not too difficult to pop a bead back on. Jack up the wheel, plug in your compressor, and hopefully, it reseats itself. If not, wrap a ratchet strap around the circumference and tighten that bad boy down while the compressor is running. It popped coming off and it’ll pop going back on.

The better option

Alternatively, you could run a type of wheel called a beadlock. As the name suggests, these use a separate ring around the rim’s edge that mechanically bolts on and locks the tyre bead in place. They’re basically impossible to roll the tyre off the rim without first undoing the bolts. This means you can run extremely low pressures off-road without worrying about losing the tyre from the wheel.

If this sounds like a bit of you, there are a few beadlock options out there – including the new BL01 from wheel legends ROH. These things are designed with hardcore wheeling in mind, and are pretty much the bees knees when it comes to heavy-duty use.

Why ROH BL01s rock

First off, they’re rated for 1550kg per corner, just the thing when you need to support over 6T of 4X4. Then there are the style points: the wheel is available in either a machined finish or matte black, and you can mix and match the centre caps and bolt colour to complement your fashion sense however you see fit.

But the real advantage of running a set of BL01s is the bead-locking ring that bolts to the outside edge. This basically makes losing an outside bead of a tyre a mechanical impossibility, which is why they’re beloved by off-road racers and rock-crawlers everywhere.

The ring effectively acts as a clamp, so even if you’re drifting at 0 psi like an absolute goon, the tyre and wheel stay connected. We can’t say the same for your wheels and the track under those circumstances, but that’s a you problem.

Legitimately, every four-wheel driver should be running these, but there’s a slight problem with that.

It ain’t all good news

Call it bureaucracy, call it blind mismanagement, call it pearl-clutchingly overzealous, but for whatever reason, bead-locked rims are illegal for on-road use in Australia and unfortunately, these are no different. And yes, we’re telling you this so we don’t get in trouble from the law. Thanks a lot, the entire legal profession.

Nevertheless, for your dedicated off-road racer or low-range crawler, these are one of the best options on the market.

We still want them. Get you some.

Find more deets on the ROH website

The ROH BL01 wheel is available for rigs with 6×139.7 PCD in 17×9 (0, -22, and -38 offsets) or for 4X4s with 5×150 PCD in 17×9 (-12 and -59 offsets).