phast930

Thank god my wife has not tried to have me committed for the Porsche disease yet. I was called by a friend of a friend telling me of a '87 944 turbo Zermatt Silver / Burgundy for a real great price so as any sane person would do I called the owner and talked to them for a while. We came to a price and I drove 1200 miles to get the car with my trailer.

I get to the car and the owner neglects to mention that somewhere in its life someone did a poor job chroming the wheels and its peeling pretty badly on all wheels on the inner barrel as well as the inner edge of the phone dials (see pics).








The car seems to be in really excellent shape sunroof, AC and everything works on this car, the only 2 issues are the wheels that are peeling and the tach doesnt seem to work.

I Just got the car home so I have literally not even taken it off the trailer.

Anyone have any ideas how to manually remove the peeling chrome and polishing the wheels. I have looked online and see what others have said, I am looking for someone here that has removed the chrome from poorly chromed wheels.

Thanks.

ian

I have tried manual techniques (sanding / blasting) to remove chrome and had little to no success, the AL wheel is actually softer than the chrome so it is just not going to work.

Bring the wheels to a chrome plate shop (or the like) and have them chemically strip them, done properly you should have a fairly even surface to prep for paint or polish.

phast930

Thank you for that, I have never attempted removal myself. Have had wheels powder coated but never tried striping then myself.

neunfünfeins

Absolutely the correct advice.

BigLou

Congrats on the new purchase.

I see your in Spring Hill, FL which is not far from Tampa. There's a company in Tampa called Glenn's wheel polishing. They are a wheel refurbisher. I'm not affiliated with nor have I ever used them but I've know a few people that have and were pretty happy with the results. They might be able to point you in the right direction.

phast930

I know Glen. He did the wheels on my Cayenne before I sold it and they looked awesome!. I was hoping for a solution to keep the cost down on the car as I will likely be reselling it (depending if my kid wants it for her Sebring HPDE car).

richard944

I've dealt with trying to get chrome off a set of BMW wheels. You will never be happy with the results at home. Get the chrome removed by a pro... and sadly it won't be dirt cheap. :/

phast930

Thank you for what I feared was the real case. I will give a couple shops a call and see what I get quoted.

ian

Not the solution you want, but it will be cheaper to buy a set of wheels in good condition that it will be to pay to have the chrome remove and the wheels refinished.

Late offset phone dials don't get a lot of love and often change hands in the $400-500 range for a decent set. Or the manhole covers (forged) often go at about that same price point as well.

Then sell off the original wheels to someone what does not care about flaking chrome, like a chump car / lemons team.

phast930

Not a bad idea. I wish someone would buy my other '87 turbo with the turbo twists on it so I could just use those Phone Dials .

I will look into that for a set of wheels to see what they would cost and what kind of shape they will be in.