Painting wheels

[t.c.mitchell]

I tried doing searches on painting the wheels and most of what i found was either someone doing it chrome, or someone just mentioning that they painted their wheels. my question is this. do i need to strip everything off, then sand, primer, and paint. my wheels are the stock grayish color. i am wanting to do them white. eventually will paint the fairings black with blue flames or the other way around and thought either way black wheels would be too much. any thoughts or suggestions?

trevor

[kevin2502000]

I repainted mine last year and not very satisfied with the out come. I used acrylic laquer in a can followed by several layers of acrylic laquer clear coat. I sanded down with 220, then 400, wipe down thorougly with denatured alcohol at least twice to get all oil, grease, fingerprint oil, etc off. Then prime with grey primer and let it sit 30 minutes or so. As long as the primer looks good and not reacting anywhere then you can go on. Any reacting, sand down that area with 220 again and make sure to feather back the area onto the good surface. Wipe down with alcohol again and re-prime. If all is good then lightly wetsand with 600 grit after drying for 30 minutes. Wipe off with a tack cloth thoroughly. Spray your color coat, I would HIGHLY suggest using acrylic enamel in a can, it goes on heavier and actually hides small inperfections. Use a light coat just enough to cover, follow the flash times on the can, probably 10 minutes or so, then a nice heavy coat to fill in everything. Follow flash time again. This is where I would clear coat it with the automotive clear through a gun. You can put on 3 good coats and it will have a decent protective coating plus you can buff it up with a Mothers power ball if you want. Using the acrylic laquer only made my wheels very easy to chip and scratch. If you are absolutely against using automotive CC, go buy clear engine enamel and use that as your top coat. Same way as the color coat, light, then medium to heavy following coats. I will be redoing mine in the future and will be doing the automotive bc/cc route.

[ct3]

you for sure want to tape anything off, I haven't painted mine but have dealt with paint rims before and the more time you spend prepping, the better the outcome always is.

[kevin2502000]

I forgot to add I was waiting for when I get new tires, that way you can paint into the groove where the tire seats giving it a good seal. I did mine with the wheel still on last time and taped it off really good.
Here is the fresh rattle can a year ago...........


Here it is a year later, notice the scratches

[t.c.mitchell]

alright, i wetsanded it down with 600 and taped everything off and then sprayed a layer of primer to see what happened and so far it seems to be doing great. so i taped the other side off and sprayed it too. i did 2 or 3 coats each side. and pretty sure that i have enough in my can for one more coat on each side. however, i am too tired to keep going. so i am going to bed and will post pics in the morning as well as finish off my last coat. btw, how much is auto cc?

[kevin2502000]

Nason quart is like 20$ and the activator 1/2 pint 10$. Watch your flash times, some of those paints you have up to 4 hrs to recoat, after that you have to wait days before recoating. The engine enamel is 10 minutes but no longer than 4 hrs.

[wyzat520]

if you are going to use rattle can, duplicolor makes wheel paint that i have used on a set of winter wheels for my truck. Been 2 years of new england winters and so far they are still really good. But I would suggest an automotive basecoat and clear coat still

[t.c.mitchell]

only problem is i don't have access to the auto paint guns and booth and such stuff. is why i am doing rattle can.

[kevin2502000]

Don't need a booth, and I painted my whole bike with a $25 gun from menards. If you have a compressor that is the way to go, if not use the enamel.

[Sasquatch]

I have seen some pretty good rims done with a rattle can.