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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2015
    Location
    Melbourne
    Posts
    202

    Default Wheel Restoration



    I picked up these wheels of ebay the other month for my GT40project. This was one of the ebayphotos, so they obviously needed some work. I drove from Melbourne to Sydney topick them up and have had them in my shed for a little bit.
    They were originally on an old XA Landowner FalconCoupe. So could be a few years old.
    The centres should be fine, will clean up nicely with somesand blasting/paint stripper/wire brush and re paint.

    The problem I have is the outer sections of the 3 piecewheel. These will un bolt and I can workon them separately.
    The outers were originally chromed but have quite a bit ofrust starting to show through. Where youcan see the colour change on the outer rim is actually silver paint! See the over spray on the tyre

    What would you do, can these be painted over, can I get themre chromed, powder coated?
    I have never had to deal with this type of problem.

    Cheers.

    Ryan

  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2012
    Location
    Oakleigh, Victoria
    Posts
    55

    Default

    Lot's of options there,

    Sandblast the chrome off them and have them re-plated.

    Are the rim sections Steel? You could have them remade in aluminium if you're keen, that way you could get precisely the width and offset you want.

    Ceramic coating or powder coating works too although with powder coating you need to need to not coat the mating faces. Metalic powder coats look pretty ordinary. Silver ceramic is pretty shiny and there's a place just around the corner from you that'll do it, Modern Plating.

    For a GT40 I'd probably try and reduce the unsprung weight as much as possible and go with aluminium outers. Whitehorse Industries are your friends if you want to head down that path.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2015
    Location
    Melbourne
    Posts
    202

    Default

    A mate has just had some rim half’s spun up from Whitehorse. These were for 18” x 10.5” fronts and they were done in 5mm thick aluminium due to the size of the barrels. The existing rims are probably 2 or 3mm steel. I can’t see a drastic weight saving from going to an aluminium rim, just lots of extra cost say $800. I’m not that fond of these wheels, but they will do for now and I was just looking to neaten them up a little. Long term I would like to get something different.

    So just looking at getting some paint on them a suppose.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    May 2012
    Location
    Oakleigh, Victoria
    Posts
    55

    Default

    Painting would be easy, sand them up and fill the rusty bits. Use an etch primer to stick to the remaining chrome. Apply you choice of colour -Job done. There's plenty of nice silver metalics to choose from.

    Not worth over investing if they're not your ideal wheel choice.

    You'd probably save at least 5kg per wheel if you went aluminium, those steel rims are heavy. I found 9kg per wheel going from steel wheels to alloy wheels. For a road going car though durability might be the objective rather than minimum weight.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2011
    Location
    Murray Bridge S Aust.
    Age
    71
    Posts
    5,942

    Default

    Ryan, if you are intending to re chrome them, they will need to be highly polished, any marks will show up dramatically. I'd tidy up the centres and paint the rims in a similar colour to the car, parts of the centre where the wheel nuts are could be painted a matching or other colour, to give a distinctive look to them.
    Kryn
    To grow old is mandatory, growing up is optional.

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