Steel Wheel Refurbishment

[jaguar68]

Hi Guys,

I have some LP917 van wheels that I would like to have refurbished and powder coated.

Does anyone have any experience with wheel refurbishment, and can this be done at any local powder coaters?

Regards

John

[mogbob]

John
The end result is always about the quality of the workmanship ( and price ).
Recommendations from local group members are good or failing that ask around at local tyre fitting places.If you can... a personal chat, face to face, usually works better than the phone but hit Yellow Pages/ Thompsons otherwise.

They use local companies/ mobile wheel refurbishers regularly .Ask a few people and see if the same names crop up each time.Making sure the company has dealt with steel wheels before is most important if you want a satisfactory job done.It's got to be better than sticking a pin in a list of names.

Bob

[PAULJ]

I had mine powder coated. came out very nice. £30 a wheel though. Problem is when you need new tyres as the weights will take the coating off.

[bmcecosse]

I laid into mine - which had quite a bit of surface rust - with flap discs in my angle grinder - eye and ear protection highly recommended. Then a brush coat of rust killing solution to get into the little 'pits' followed by a red oxide undercoat all over - and a brush coat of chassis black on the inside and Dulux Magnolia*on the outside - they look great - and it didn't cost anything really! Just a couple of afternoons work.
I believe powder coating is much over-rated......it can easily chip off.
* Bonus here - since the garage doors are Magnolia the new paint comes from Household budget - and not from my Classic car budget!
Edit - just remembered it was 'knotted wire' wheels (one flat and one cup shape) in the angle grinder - not 'flap' wheels.

[charlie_morris_minor]

i refurbished my own wheels, my local tyre place fitted all the weights on the inside so the paint was not scratched.

[beero]

Powder coating looks really good (too perfect for a 60s car) but if it gets chipped you can't touch it up and it will rust and bring off even more coating. I would agree with bmc about painting them.

[PAULJ]

i refurbished my own wheels, my local tyre place fitted all the weights on the inside so the paint was not scratched.

Wheels are balaced both ways, you will have weights inside and outside.

Hamerite do a very good match for old english white for touch ups

[bmcecosse]

For the width of our wheels - and the speed of our cars - balance weights on one side (inside if you wish) will be fine. I balance mine using the well tried 'static' method - and any weights used are on the one side - and there is NO vibration right up to silly speed.

[charlie_morris_minor]

paul i only have weights on the inside of the wheel. There are none are on the outside to scratch my new paintwork. I have driven the car at 70ish on the motorway and I have not detected any unbalanced wheel "wobble" at any speed.