I’m currently the middle of wedding prep, and that means emailing/calling vendors; following up with invited guests; and buying all sorts of random things like wedding card boxes and “Just Married Signs” and suits and, of course, wedding bands. As I’m not one to go the traditional route on pretty much anything, I decided against a standard gold band; I wanted something car-ish, so I thought to myself: “What car-like thing is the shape of a wedding ring?” Then it came to me: A tire!
It turns out, tire rings are a thing — I had no clue. But it seems like there are all sorts of vendors on Etsy making custom rings that look like tires. Unfortunately, the first vendor, named Racerings — a big one in the tire-ring space — stopped making tire rings out of Titanium, which is the material I wanted (since I think its color would look the most accurate, and it’d be durable). But then I happened upon an Etsy vendor named Jason Olsen, who runs VentureCustomShop out of Nebraska.
I peeked at a few of the rings in his online store, and asked if he could make me a custom one out of Titanium. I was trying to decide between the classic look of a BFG All-Terrain or my favorite off-road tire, the Goodyear Wrangler Duratrac.
Jason said he could do either. In fact, after I sent him the exact tire treads, he even scanned them both into his software:
Look at how detailed the tread is! Surely the final product won’t have sipes, right? Surely they’re far too small?:
After just a couple of days, Jason sent me a few photos of my titanium ring, right after sandblasting and before any coating had been applied:
Then Jason added a “Battleworn” finish, which he says hold up extremely well to abuse, which is good, because when I wrench I destroy pretty much everything (my phone has taken a beating over the years).
It looks pretty good:
Then Jason sent me this glamour shot, and my jaw hit the floor:
Holy smokes! That looks like an actual Goodyear Wrangler Duratrac!
Within fewer than 10 days of my initial request, I had this box at my front door:
Look at how absurdly detailed this thing is!
Total cost was $320, which is significantly cheaper than a standard gold ring. Yes, Titanium isn’t as precious as gold, but boy am I blown away, and excited to wear this thing everyday.
Really cool ring, but the tread design is going to get filthy fast.
But imagine the grip it will have on shower spaghetti.
I don’t know why I assume he eats it with his hands.
Okay, I’ve been seeing this meme for ages…. What exactly is shower spaghetti??
It’s spaghetti eaten in a shower. Something DT has done, and possibly no one else ever. I can’t remember if it was early Autopian or late Jalopnik, but it should be googleable.
I can’t imagine it doesn’t make both the shower and the spaghetti significantly worse, unlike, say, eating cookies in a bath, or drinking beer in a swimming pool.
…. Oh wow
https://www.theautopian.com/moving-is-terrible-and-moving-david-is-worse-day-one-on-the-road/
Thank you!
Not a problem. A little scum will add authenticity.
Even so, a minute with an old toothbrush one a week will remove a lot of the gunk.
I would recommend – strongly – that you consider getting one (or several, have fun with it) in silicon as well, or at least a simple silicon band. Metal rings and machinery can lead to very sudden and irreparable damage to one’s phalanges, including the gruesome “degloving”.
Also you should see if you can put out some anonymous feelers to Goodyear to see if they’ll throw in some sponsorship for your wedding, ha.
Massive kudos to the artist and modern manufacturing that can even get the zig-zag snow-teeth patterns in that. Very impressive.
I’d say you’re going to have a good year. And hopefully many more to come.
Yeah, absolutely. A silicon band is recommended around any form of machinery. As a Jeweller, I can tell you that Titanium is one of the worst materials to make a ring out of. For one it can’t be resized. Secondly, the strength/hardness to price ratio that makes it attractive initially, is what makes it a dangerous material to be worn on a finger. In the case of an emergency, it can’t be cut off without specialist equipment. Both my brother and father have had to have rings cut off as a result of accidents and both would have potentially lost their fingers had they been Titanium. Leave that one in it’s box and get a Platinum one made.
$320 is the price of 1 Duratrac tire, before install.
Man that seems like it would be a pain to keep clean. Also I hope no lawyers from the tire companies are reading this article or that artist is gonna get hit with a cease and desist for using their tread pattern without giving them a cut.
Does it come with tread wear indicators? 🙂
Looks great, and, as rings go…cheap!
This gives me an idea for a drum-themed ring. My wedding band is almost 20 years old now and is looking kinda tired.
Ahem.
$320? I was impressed with the result when I thought it was an expensive custom piece, but that seems like an amazing deal to me.
I lose wedding rings a lot. Sometimes it makes for an awkward conversation (“So, you came home from a work trip to Miami Beach and somehow lost your ring?”), but she knew me for a long time before we were married so she’s not really surprised.
I am going to look at one of these. Thanks for sharing.
Try to get a set of 4.
I wonder if he ordered an extra 8. They would look cute stacked up next to the spare i3 tires.
I’m now up to 12 of those.
Rings, Tires or i3s?
Nice option! I actually have a stainless steel one with a gold band around the middle of it for durability but also for the goooooold.
I agree with others if you’re actually working on something, a silicon band is a better option. Actually doesn’t even have to be wrenching related, Jimmy Fallon almost lost his finger due to his wedding ring catching on the counter a few years back so it’s just a regular everyday risk.
My wife doesn’t mind what I wear so long as we’re together, I could’ve had a ring pop and she’d probably been fine with it. She did have very specific directions for her ring though 😀
Post-Apollo, the astronaut Neil Armstrong was working on his farm when he jumped off the back of his truck and snagged his wedding ring on something (a hook on the bedside, I think?) which took his finger off. He put the finger on some ice and had it reattached by surgeons at a nearby hospital.
Many years ago when I briefly took body shop classes in trade school before switching to different studies the body shop teacher insisted that we take our rings off before working on cars because in his youth he saw a co-worker inadvertently get his gold wedding ring wedged between a positive battery terminal and a ground point (apparently while the car was running or operating the starter motor) which caused the gold (which is one of the most electrically conductive materials out there) to melt around his finger, egad. He strongly advised us to get either silicone rings or tattoo rings.
Tattoo rings for the win! It was actually my wife’s idea because she doesn’t wear jewelry and only misplaced her engagement ring three times.
I work with robots for a living so no jewelry is the expectation anyways. And as a bonus point, it turns out it’s REALLY hard to lose a tattoo.
The ring from my first marriage had a chunk melted out from it when I was fixing a damaged wiring harness on a motorcycle.
That’s when I started taking it off for working on stuff.
That is awesome!!
I love when people get custom bands- mines dinosaur bone and turqoise. The bone even came from Utah! Not that standard gold isnt good.
Also- get some silicone bands for workshop time!
I have discovered, though it never occurred to me that it was true till the back nine of life, that a local jeweler is one of those professions every family should establish a relationship with, like mechanics and handy men. A jeweler, not a jewelry seller.
I used to think that was for rich people with piles of disposable income, but I’ve discovered that they’re probably not nearly as expensive as you think and even if they can be a little spendy at times, if you’ve got a good one working for you then you’ll be hard pressed to find a higher cost:satisfaction ratio with anything you throw some of your meager discretionary funds at.
I believe that many of them, if not most of them, do it for the love of the craft rather than the money and they will fall all over themselves trying to blow you away once they figure out you’re not a tire kicker that just wants to dream out loud to them.
The guy our family uses was kind of cool at first. Not rude exactly, just obviously indulgent as we talked and I just knew he was sighing and rolling his eyes when I turned my back. But after commissioning a couple pieces from him we’re all good and he’s totally collaborative and game for anything now. The wedding band I currently wear was designed by my wife and him without my knowledge and given to me for an anniversary gift at 21yrs I think it was. They absolutely freaking nailed it. I’ve never been so happy with any gift ever in my life. I love it so much. And he was willing to use some of her jewelry as source material, which drastically cut the cost so that it was somewhere between ‘not expensive’ and ‘heeeyy, not bad at all’.
Side note here. Agree 100% with you. My wife’s fam had a relationship with their Jewlers going back to 1945.
I had to cut my wedding band off 3 times. Don’t ask…It was that or lose the finger.
Cut each time with side cutting pliers asap from my toolbox as fast as possible.
Took it to her Jewlers each time. It was pretty destroyed looking each time. Got it back in 2-3 days time. Cost to repair, and reshape? $10 bucks each time. Unreal.
Going the non-Treaditional route… I like it!
RoosterRings on Etsy has a silicone ring version of an off road tire. I wear them for safety sake and if I lose it, it’s $24.
Cool! I no longer wear my wedding ring after it partially degloved my finger 20 years ago, but if I did, I’d want it to be something that really meant something to me (or to her). Ridiculously underpriced, especially for a custom piece.
I got a tattoo instead. When I first got married I found myself in high voltage panels for production equipment. Didn’t want a ring.
Best decision I ever made. Never have to worry about it, yet it is always there.
What are the risks I should look out for re: wearing a ring while wrenching. Obviously electrical work is up there.
Oh the filth you’re going to trap underneath and within it!
I take mine off when doing grubby chores.
Degloving is #1, but followed closely behind by things like snags taking your finger/hand/arm off. There is a very, very, very good reason mechanics and machinists do not wear rings or any other jewellery when wrenching or in the shop.
Simple solution- get a quick detach necklace you can put it on when wrenching and stuff under your shirt, but for the love of God and as you value your fingers/hands/arms/life, do not wear a ring when wrenching.
I should also point out that titanium has risk in it’s strength and durability- if you happen to say smash your finger with it still on, and it swells so much you can’t get it off, then the hospital is left with having to amputate the finger to get the ring off, and hopefully reattach it later because titanium rings can’t be safely cut off swollen fingers. Gold, being much softer, can.
just google “degloving injury finger” and you’ll never wear your metal ring again while doing anything with your hands
i wear silicone rings 99% of the time anymore
Wife was a firefighter/emt now an er nurse. she has seen some stuff, including full hand degloving.
Anything with rotating moving parts is a major risk. Also, reaching up high for things(getting ring caught on a nail for example). In my understanding it’s more likely a power tool or something around the house that will really hurt you. But sticking your hand in a tight spot and getting weirdly stuck is still scary if not outright dangerous.
The tougher and harder the metal used in the ring, the greater the risk. 24k gold is soft enough that it will likely break before you do. And it’s non-magnetic.
My wedding band is 14k gold, so it may provide a tiny bit of protection… But as a member of the order of the engineer I wear a traditional stainless steel on my pinky of my dominant hand, my only consolation there is that it isn’t a super important finger.
While climbing down a chain link fence my ring caught a little bump of galvanizing. Luckily it turned my ring into a pointy egg shaped object and didn’t take off my finger.
For me, it was grabbing a bit of angle iron overhead, and then lost my footing, leaving my entire weight being held briefly by my ring which caught on the lip.
Yeah a ring that shorts a circuit can weld itself to the source, leaving you basically attached to it. Just take the thing off anytime you’re near anything where you may want to pull your hand away quickly: heat, power, moving parts, feral cats…
Emergency rooms have ring cutters. I used to have a tungsten wedding band until an ER doc friend explained they can’t cut those off after an incident like above, they need to be smashed or ground off.
I never wear my ring in the shop.
Although I must admit, when women see me ringless and turning wrenches they just lose control. Thats the risk of not wearing a ring while wrenching.
So, to avoid constant unwanted sexual advances while trying to repair a vehicle, make sure you wear a silicone ring. Also, make sure you always store your real ring in the same place.
What type of metal was your ring? My understanding is that gold rings of at least 14k(preferably higher) are safer as the metal is much more likely to deform or break rather than removing your skin.
It was gold, and it deformed, but into about the nastiest shape it could have chosen.
Oof I’m sorry to hear that. Almost all the horror stories with rings are from situations where someone was reaching above their head for something.
I wore mine while riding a mechanical bull once and learned a painful but thankfully not permanent lesson.
That came out pretty good. I went with Titanium as well, its a good choice!
+1 for titanium, and 10mm wide, which helps great with identifying fastener sizes in a pinch.
Recently Mercedes did a piece about sticky steering wheels. I commented how one made my wedding band spin as I wound out a turn.
David’s ring here, with all of that tread, would spin like a top in the same situation. And in an emergency, he could use it to trail-repair one of his Jeeps.
I know what you’re thinking. That big moment is coming. You’re going punctuate your love under the marriage canopy with the ring you will wear forever. You need to make sure it’s a true symbol of love. A simple gold band won’t do. You’re going to need something with heart. Something with sentimental value. Something that keeps contact with that finger in all weather conditions.
Sure, you can call Cartier or Tiffany, but at GoodYear, we know the truth. When it comes to all-weather traction, their rings absolutely SUCK. Love is eternal. And do you know what eternal means? It means during sunshine, rain, sleet, snow, mud, poorly maintained off-road trails that you’re traversing in a postal Jeep with rusted terrain.
Sure. Trust your marriage… your future… your life to David Yurman. Let us know how that goes. Or get a Duratec wedding ring and keep that finger on track no matter what God himself dares to throw at it.
GoodYear. When you see other people’s marriages crashed in a ditch waiting for a friendly Jeep to pull them out, you’ll thank us, dammit.
My God, the BRILLIANCE that is this post! I bow to your creativity!
That is very cool!
I know from personal experience that if she’s willing to have an engine hoist and tool box on the top of the wedding cake, she’s a keeper.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a18739184/lemons-goodbad-idea-of-the-week-lemons-weddings/
Awesome design DT!
That’s rad, man. Props.
That ring is so dang cool!
Glad you found what you were looking for and love it at the same time!
One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.
That’s awesome. Does Elise get a matching Dunlop sport tire?
Haha
Clearly a Michelin gal…
I went with Dunlop because Elise (not her real name or nationality) is British.
OMG! DT. You have the coolest wedding ring ever there.
Jason does fantastic work for sure.
And the cost? Well that’s just nuts.
Gonna save up and hope to get one soon.
Good luck with all the wedding prep guy.
And where its my invite? Still waiting. lol.
Thank you!
(The wedding is going to be small!)
That is SO cool. I love it. I have had 3 sets of Duratrac tires. Just remember when using power tools to remove the ring before the powertool removes your finger.
Good point!
4jim has more than a good point. I’m a EMT, and the ring cutters carried on an ambulance will not cut titanium. If you injure you finger and it starts to swell a ring like that cannot be removed. If the injury is bad enough, that ring may cost you your finger.
Moral of the story, remove the ring before working on things.
this was my thought, I was told no titanium for this reason, I’m getting married most likely in jan!
Congrats!
I wear silicone wedding bands for this very reason. And since they are cheap, replacing them after damage is no big deal.
I was gonna do that, but my wife was like “that’s not the band I put on your finger during the ceremony”, so nope.
I almost always wear leather gloves while wrenching.
We both use silicon bands for activities where we’d rather leave the rings at home. I’ve had mine come off in a swimming pool once on vacation, not gonna deal with that again.
Once knew a guy who was welding and had an ember burn through his glove, into his ring, causing his finger to swell from the burn. And gloves don’t prevent broken fingers
I’m not married, but I just got an Oura smart rings that are entirely titanium bodied. Didn’t realize I needed this advice at first, but I’ll be damn sure to take it off before wrenching from here on out.
careful with Titanium. It’s really hard so if your finger gets swollen or you put on some marriage pounds that ring could get stuck and since it’s hard, may take a special saw to get off. It’s really cool but you may want to get a silicone version of it too as an everyday ring just in case.
Check out the cool technology the ER had to use to cut off my titanium Duratrac ring after an unfortunate late night wrenching session.
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You are thinking of tungsten carbide rings (like mine), titanium is harder than gold but not by a lot.
Most tungsten carbide can be cut with bolt cutters, or “crushing” it with a bench vise or large pair of vise grips. It’s hard, but relatively brittle. Sure, you’ll likely chip the bolt cutters, but it’ll still get the ring off due to the mechanical advantage each of these apply.
Yes, smashing it is the trick I remember reading about when I got mine. In an emergency though, paramedics might not have vise grips available.
Titanium is WAY harder than gold. 24k gold is soft enough to indent easily with a bite. Of course tungsten carbide is harder than nearly anything except diamond.
Interestingly, in 2016 a gold-titanium alloy was discovered that is 4 times harder than pure titanium.
But strength and toughness is the real issue. Titanium is very tough which is why it is riskier than even most steel alloys or tungsten carbide.
All relative I suppose.
Since I had carbide on the brain, that does tend to minimize the hardness distance between gold and Ti.
The point was that titanium can be cut off with regular jeweler’s ring cutters and is not especially risky.
A titanium ring saved Bud’s finger in The Abyss, so I am going to go with the glass half full option here.
That’s why I got titanium!
Never heard of it
I think I may have been more surprised if you had. It’s one of James Cameron’s earlier movies between The Terminator and T2. I give it to android thumbs up. I’m sure it must be streaming somewhere, but I bought the 4K UHD disc that finally came out earlier this year. Been waiting 20+ years for an upgrade to the ancient DVD.
It also holds up well with chemicals, like those found in an undersea habitat’s toilet.
You can cut titanium rings off with a standard ring cutter. Something an emergency room should have, most decent sized fire departments, and most jewelers.
Most titanium alloys aren’t particularly hard…
Rubberband-esque aspect ratio, that thing is going to get savaged around here. Needs more sidewall.
Looks like about a 305/25/30
Lol. I do love me some sidewall, but not in this application haha
Looks more like a 12/25/0.75
Needs more cowbell too. YMMV