Painting wheels.

I have a set of black painted steel wheels that I want to make silver. Thankfully they are newer and not rusty yet.

So, clean them good, scuff up the paint, wipe down with mineral spirits, and a couple coats of color then clear? Being already painted, there should be no need for primer, yes? Any certain sand paper or steel wool I should use to scuff them up? How many cans do I need for 4 wheels? Anything else?

Scotch brite pads. The Aggressive ones like the maroon colors or the grey. A can of brakleen and some paint is all I do.

Two cans will = like 3-4 coats on 4 wheels (17"+ or BBS style, etc) of the DupliColor paint. Pass on the clear, it yellows.

Aggressive scotch brite and 2 cans of silver, hold the clear. How does the paint hold up without the clear?

In reply to neon4891:

Dont clearcoat paints intended as single step, only those intended to be clearcoated. Adhesion is the primary problem.

You can purchase rattle can paints intended specifically for wheel use (better durability under higher temps than the stuff intended for lawn chairs, like the one step Duplicolor HWP101.

Wurth may make the best 2-step products for this including color spray and clearcoat, but they are kind of pricey. I used the Wurth (sold under the Griots label at the time) on a set of basketweave BBS a few years back and they held up pretty well to repeated coatings with Hawk racing brake pad dust.

I painted my truck wheels with a PPG acrylic enamel with a hardener and they haven't held up all that well. The paint chips easliy. I rcently had to replace a bent wheel and used the Duplicoclor wheel paint at first. I ran out before I got it compeletely covered, so I used some type of super spray bomb silver paint that is looking really good. Before i painted, I stripped the wheel with paint stripper and used some old school zinc chromate that I found on the shelf of a hardware store as primer.

I painted my winter steel wheels on the Rolla with Rustoleum Professional 4-5 years ago. They have been holding up fine. Clean very thoroughly, scuff up with 320-ish, wipe down with mineral spirits based thinner, paint.

I used engine paint ( the high temp kind) on my e30 wheels (bottlecaps) and they seem to e holding up in year 2

I painted my winter steelies purple from black. Scuffed em good with some scotch-brites- blew off the big dust, wiped em down good with mineral spirits, and shot em with Valspar rattle can. Took about two cans to do all 4. Look pretty good all things considered.

Just did these:

Rusty old American Racing wagon wheels, wire wheel on a drill, two coats of Rustoleum rusty metal primer and 2 coats of Rustoleum Wildflower Blue enamel. A few chips from mounting the tires and tightening the lugs, but they look fine from 5 feet.

Ha, timely thread tackling the Mustang wheels this weekend, will post pics then

I have used the duplicolor stuff to good advantage. Holds up well

We just discussed this last month. It's a great read: http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/teach-me-about-wheel-paints/52053/page1/

In reply to Javelin:

Thank you, I forgot about that thread.

Only it brings up more questions

Well, spill it man! We like to help. Besides, I'm getting ready to paint some wheels, too.

I've had terrible luck painting steel wheels with rattle cans and having it stick well. I think it's probably the (lack of) prep and/or atmospheric conditions, but I don't know.

I did sandblasting and grill paint that's worked quite well.

Mostly just all the different paint options in the original tread.

Now I also want to 2-tone the alloys for the wife's car.

And clean up and paint the rusty steelies with my snows. First part is cleaning them up, then maybe the hammer finish green rustolium. I mean, thermos/toolbox green steel wheels/blue car/silver stripes/black door. Classy, right?