painting aluminum rims

[bullridin_fool]

the rim's on my 96 are in rough shape as far as looks go. they've got lots of dings and such in them and are beyond repolishing. does anyone have any tips on painting aluminum rim's? i'm not sure what color i wanta go with but i think i wanta paint them.

 

[RacinDuallie]

How about Powder coating them? Paint does chip too easily

 

[Billysgoat]

Take the rims somewhere and have them BEAD blasted, NOT sandblasted to remove all of the factory coatings and dirt etc. Next use sandpaper (fine grit) to buff up the bad scratches etc. Once you have the rims prepped good wipe them down with acetone and let dry just before shooting the primer.

If bead blasting is not an option you can do the same with sandpaper, just takes a while. You need to be sure and get both the factory coatings off as well as scratch the surface of the aluminium for paint adhesion.

A Zinc Chromate primer tends to work best for priming bare aluminium, but it's hard to come by nowadays. Talk to your local paint store that handles auto refinish stuff, they should be ale to point you in the right direction.

 

[BFD99]

i say go with Powdercoated, more scratch resistant, thats what i plan to do if need ever be.

 

[TooMuchBoost]

Zinc Chromate is nice but does funny things to the body....LOL


The rims only need to be stripped if painted or clearcoated (over Al) from the factory which you didn't mention. I've repaired plenty of damaged painted wheels w/o stripping the entire wheel.

If they aren't painted and you are going to paint them you can simply sand them with anywhere between 80 to 180 grit. Due to a national VOC rule change the resins used in epoxy get their absolute best adhesion over 80 grit but its not required on an old set of wheels.

Any time you sand Al and change the surface from a neutral to positive charge the faster you can wash them with wax and grease remove and apply epoxy primer the better because Al quickly forms a film that hinders adhesion.

Apply two coats of epoxy primer then base clear them if no body work is needed but if it is apply any body filler over epoxy not under it. I've had good luck fixing curb rash on wheels with leveling products like Metal Glaze or Dolphin Glaze. You could use 2K primer over the epoxy to fill the scratches but it depends on depth because the typical 2K primer covers 180 sand scratches after 2-3 coats and usually isn't recommended over coarser grits.

FWIW every silver wheel I have ever matched has been a std mixing base silver straight off of a paint mixing machine that you would find in a body shop or paint store. Simply compare the metallic size from the wheel to the silver toners on the machine to get a match, let the tech add binder/blender/metallic stabilizer etc then you are good to go.

If you ever decide to clear over bare Al wheels note that 99.9% of typical auto body clears will not adhere to Al long term regardless of what someone tells you. If they insist ask for this unique spec in writing.

 

[Burner]

I wonder what ACCU-SHIELD is on a rim? Accuride Corporation: All Around Leader in Wheels