Not so sure. In your area. Fiesta with 15" steels. There is almost certainly not a round one in existence. Alloys defenitly live better though they too are often damaged. Too low a profile tyre.Ah, well I only talked about modern steel wheels because they are the ones I used to design. I don't know how they used to make the rims before they developed the welds up to the point where they could withstand the forming process.
Steel wheels are a 'better' product to my mind, at least in the small sizes, than alloys.
Lee- you have to be very careful to differentiate between wheels and tires that are designed for Australian conditions, and those designed for Europe in partiuclar, and even the USA. For example we took a USA 4wd outback, and its poxy tires optimised for rolling resistance all blew within 100 km. Fitted some decent Coopers and no more problems.
Again for wheels both Ford of Australia and Holden have additional strength requirements /way/ beyond overseas markets.
Steel wheels do have a fatigue life at some point they will let go. I'd guess a half a million miles of street use would be a conservative target.
And most modern cars [last 5 or so years] have Chinese wheels. And the Chinese have a reputation of not making things to spec if they can save a few dollars. I have seen cracked VE steels and FG 18s. Though both had been abused.