So I have been wanting to do this for a while in preparation to get my current wheels off of my ride and put on the sexy / classy 5 spokes...However, the 5 spokes that I got with my ride had curb rash, nicks, and scratches on them and needed new tires which I purchased recently (BF Goodrich F1 A/S 215/45/R17)...
With the purchase of tires completed I just needed to repair and paint my rims to get them ready for the tires and car mount...I followed the tutorials I found online as best I could and decided to take pictures along the way to help anyone interested in trying something similar...
Materials...
320 grit sand paper (wet sanding)
400 grit sand paper (wet sanding)
600 grit sand paper (wet sanding)
3M bondo
hose and lots of water
cloth for cleaning and drying
Dupli-Color Scratch Filler Primer - 1 can (< $5 pep boys)
Dupli-Color High Performance Wheel Coating (silver) - 1 can ($5.99 pep boys)
Dupli-Color High Performance Wheel Coating (clear) - 1 can ($5.99 pep boys)
100 pack of 3x5 index cards (walmart, $0.44)
Paint Prep rag I got from Pep boys ($1.99)
Painters tape (walmart, few bucks)
First I wet sanded all five rims with the 320 and hosed / wiped them all down after that...I then did the same thing with the 400 and 600 grit papers and then let them air dry for a while when I was done...
After this I then applied bondo to any area of the rim with a deep scratch, curb rash, or various other nicks that they may have had...I let that dry for about a half over then sprayed the rims down and then got to work with the 320 grit...Here you need to remember not to use your finger and sand hard as you will lose the bondo in the scratch...the trick is to sand with a block of some sort to match the surface of the rim...
I then used the 600 grit on the bondo to get rid of the excess bondo and do the final prep before paiint...I used the paint prep pad on all of the rims (one pad worked for all of the rims; can be found at Pep Boys for $1.99)
Then I used blue painters tape (you can use masking tape) to tape up the valve stems...Then I used the index cards to protect the tires from paint (see pics)... I then did 3 coats of scratch filler primer...I made sure to get all parts of the rim on each rim and then moved to the next 4...I then went back to the first one and in the end I did 3 coats of primer on all five rims (took about 40 minutes)...
I let them dry for a half hour and then took care of some over spray with 600 grit wet sanding...after this, i wiped them with the paint prep again (same one if it still is moist) and then started with the silver color coatings...I did 4 coats of this making sure to avoid over spray and to keep the coatings lights...
I then did 4 coats of clear (didnt know how to guage this so I just did 4; hopefully it isnt too much gloss or too little gloss). Here is the end result...
Overall, this cost me about $20 as I already had most of the sandpaper, index cards, prep pad, tape and bondo)...Money well spent to make the stock classies like new again...
The wheels are going on this bad boy next week...
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