DieselSpider wrote:
Spent some time on the Nardi web site and could not find this exact wheel. The classic only appears to be available in sueded leather or perforated with the red stitching and none of the wheels had a raised red colored signature on them or the scuffed thin black treatment where the signature was located.
Exactly !
Plus Nardi's wholesale price is higher then this retail.
Special - you've made your point We get it. You don't want to buy one of these wheels, fine. There's lot's of people who don't want to pay over $200 for a steering wheel who may well find this one acceptable. Get over it.
Bruce Shearer
'80 Spider Fi
'10 Volvo XC70
'06 GMC 1 Ton PU
'72 Spider a long, long time ago
Where is nothing wrong with buying reproduction , for as long as you know you are buying a reproduction and not the original item.
All I wanted to say this item is misrepresented.
I just hope nobody ends up like this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMxB4RpCDzA
Yes there is an inherent danger when we see that potentially counterfeit products have made it into the mainstream supply. When something does not seem right it is our duty to vet it out so nobody is harmed even by an innocent mistake. It goes beyond saving a buck as the price difference/discount pales in comparison to the value of a human life.
If they are just very old stock of discontinued items/styles that's fine but if they are not and could endanger a member then that's a very serious matter.
A quick check with the Hourses Mouth reveals that these are not genuine Nardi wheels but are just fakes which the Nardi representative was very quick to point out. Potentially unsafe and the people distributing them are a bunch of criminals working deception.
I hope Mark is able to get his investment back and does not loose too much on the deal.
I really hope that Nardi takes hard action against the counterfeit supply chain and gets to the counterfeiters themselves. It must really be very irksome to develop a product and name only to see a bunch of crooks then use your name and reputation to dupe good folks.
I also hope Mark is now in contact with Nardi confirming what they told me and is working with them to get to the bottom of all this.
It would be nice to see Nardi touring the US with a platoon of deputies in tow raiding warehouses and pulling fake products with their name on them out into garbage trucks sending it all to the shredder. I can remember some years ago another Italian manufacturer doing similar and it was nice to see them having the satisfaction of personally throwing out the trash.
I haven't responded to these posts while I've been doing some research and contacting the supplier I got these wheels from. So let me give some background.
I've been searching for a steering wheel supplier for a few years. As many of you know, I carry NRG and Volante wheels now. Most of the sample wheels I've found haven't had great finish or stitching, or something that just didn't fit in what I was looking for. I met a euro vendor at SEMA that offered me a special buy on a batch of wheels, that I was led to believe, were licensed by Nardi. The leather, fit and finish was excellent, far superior to any other wheel I'd looked at. The serial number on the back showed up on the Nardi authentication site. While this style wasn't listed on the Nardi site, I didn't really expect to find it there since a licensed product isn't made by the original company. We carry several licensed products currently without any issues.
After contacting the seller this week, they now admit they don't have a current license from Nardi.
So, perhaps I was nieve, but I now know these are replicas. For anyone to state that these wheels will fail, without seeing one in person or testing them, is complete bs. The wheel in a previous post is not the same wheel as I what I have pictured. Nardi is not the only steering wheel manufacturer that can make a quality wheel
