Big wheels (for grownups)

Robbie Casselman built what he says is the tallest car in the Carolinas. These days that's saying something. The blue 1991 Chevy Caprice stands in a body-shop lot here under the South Carolina sun on an altogether commonplace set of 15-inch-diameter wheels that would look just fine on your grandmother's Lumina.

When it eases out of the painting bay here at Mr. Scrape Customs, this highly modified ride will sit, more fittingly, on its usual gleaming chrome 28s – the same size wheels that are mounted on the company's hulking red Hummer H2.

Welcome to the sky-scraping South, where old (sometimes decades old) American sedans with "donk," "box," and "bubble" bodies – those are enthusiasts' designations based on appearance – increasingly wind up wearing very big shoes.

Forget the oversized rims – 20-inch. "dubs" – long celebrated in rap songs. Mr. Casselman says he knew he'd seen the roots of "the next big thing" when a client showed up a couple of years ago with a boxy 1984 Chevrolet and a set of 24s.

"It couldn't turn," Casselman says. "But he didn't care. He liked the way it looked."

He liked the car even better with a custom-built suspension that gave it functionality along with a monster-truck stance.

Today, plenty of other modifiers like it, too. If Miami is the high-riding trend's starting line, the Carolinas and Georgia and parts of Tennessee and Texas have fast become its cruising strips. Expect it to spread. Competition is king in the car-modifier world.

"It's all about who's taller, who's got bigger wheels, who's got more money in their paint," says Brian Scotto, senior editor at Rides magazine in New York, which recently spawned a new publication called "Donk, Box & Bubble" to celebrate the emerging automotive movement.

In the high-flash world of automobile customization – from the throwback low-rider Impalas of east Los Angeles to the nitrous-oxide fueled "tuner" Hondas that began to swarm even the toniest East Coast suburbs early in this "Fast and the Furious" decade – it's often about performance. But it's always about plumage.

And in a from-the-ground-up modification of anything from a VW Jetta to a growling, lowered pickup, it's often the rims that make the first bold statement.

Custom wheels have routinely increased their market share in recent years, and they generally lead all other modifications in popularity, according to reports from the Specialty Equipment Market Association in Diamond Bar, Calif.

Car manufacturers, in fact, have taken a cue from the after-market crowd, rolling out an array of new vehicles with factory-installed, 18-inch alloy rims fitted with low-profile tires that have almost nonexistent sidewalls (not ideal, it should be noted, for negotiating potholes).

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