Patent ID: 7775605

Claim:
A wheel assembly for a vehicle, comprising: a wheel having a front rim half and a rear rim half secured together to form an annular outer rim for receiving a tire; the front and rear rim halves have aligned central openings for receiving wheel hub and aligned apertures for receiving fasteners for mounting the wheel hub on a hub face of the rear rim half; the central opening of at least one of the rim halves having a plurality of spaced recesses around its periphery; a rock guard built into the wheel having a plurality of rock guard portions each forming a shield which substantially fills any space between a respective recess and an attached wheel hub to block at least some debris from passing through the wheel; and each rim half having an end wall facing the end wall in the other rim half, the aligned central openings extending through the end walls, and wherein the rock guard is formed integrally with an end wall of one of the rim halves, the rock guard portions helping to define an outer periphery of the central opening in said one rim half.