Shark Attack

well I spent the better part of Saturday cleaning ONE yes ONE wheel, thats how dirty they are.

So I started with the dupont wheel stuff and I must say it does work and will most likly keep my wheels clean after i get them clean the first time.

BUT..

After I got the wheel 95% clean I was disappointed to find that the finish is yucky (for lack of a better word) if you look close at the wheel it looks like it has acid rain marks in them like you would find on a waxed car.

So I guess I need to polish them. I started out with the standard turtle wax polish in the green can with a high speed buffer.. nada... next I moved to a the turtle wax red compound- NADA

next I move to Mothers metal polish- nada

none of these even touched it . WTF do i do now?

IcemanG17

I'm guessing you have the standard flat dish wheels.....my wheels were 1/2 assed polished when I got them......but they have some seriously fossilized brake dust inside the wheels all over the place......so you have two options to clean them up

Get them powdercoated......this the best option for great looking easy to clean wheels..BUT its pricey

Get them polished.....this will work on the face.....but no so much everywhere else...then you have to maintain them...which is alot of work...I used mothers powerball with their polish...it worked good, but still is alot of work

IMNSHO...your best option is to upgrade to 17 or 18" wheels....it makes the 928 look so much more modern....and most are easier to clean too...heres a pic of my Carrera III 18" wheels

joejoe

For dust brake I used the cheap autozone carb cleaner. I have polished 2 sets of dish wheels and have yet to go back for clean up on them. To do a polish right does take time, but finish is mirror like. I have also used wheel paint for 2 sets of phone dial rims and they came out very nice (cost for 8 rims about $40)

Now there is a product by MarkV products that is great for removing hard water stains. I have used this on my '81 to get rid of stains on the passenger side paint and windows. I obtained my gallon from my brother who has a car lot, so not sure where it might be located other than from a supplier. What I liked most about this was after trying polish, light compound, and getting ready to try the real gritty stuff my brother suggested this. Using a cloth with very minimal effort and all came off. You do want clean water to rinse while working. I did not use this on the wheels as they were too far gone (down to metal in parts and paint over all poor)

Shark Attack

how do i polish the rims?

leperboy

They are anodized, so you can either sand through the anodized finish or soak them in something that will strip it off.

Sanding is a lot of work. You start with 400 grit and sand by hand, then once the anodized layer is off, go to 800, then 1200 and 2000, then polish using Mother's Aluminum polish. That'll give you a mirror shine.

Easier is to soak them in a tub of 5% lye solution for about ten minutes. Pull them out, polish them with Mother's about five times and you get a mirror finish. Although, if you have any imperfections, you will still need to sand those out. Some say Easy-Off oven cleaner also works, but you have to find the most toxic Easy-Off you can find. In either case, be very watchful as to how long you leave it on. If it stays on too long it'll start to pit the aluminum.

Once they are polished, they will oxidize very quickly, so you need to treat them with something. First, use a citrus degreaser to remove the Mother's polish. Por-15's PC-Glisten can be applied directly to metal and is like a very hard clearcoat. Eastwood has a similar product called Diamond something. Evr-brite is also pretty good. Or, if you don't want a clearcoat, you can use Rejex, Boeshield T-9 or Flitz as a wax that will last about a year between reapplications.

Matt

joejoe

I am assuming with polish you want to go to metal. For mine I used orbital air sander and different grit sand paper. Started with 180 for anodising removal and getting down to bare metal. This will leave the wheel looking like crap, however you can remove many flaws (if there are any). On my 8" rims there was a 6 -8" score across the face which I was able to make disappear. Next was 220 then 320 grit to get rid of the 180 scratching. When done with these you will see a bit of reflection again. It will be enough to tell if there are any gouges left that need to be addressed. If there are do them as going further will not make them go away.

When happy with look go to higher grit. I used a 600, 800, 1000, and finished with 3000 for final.

The one real difficult part (for me at least) was the rim lip. For this I used a dremmel with rough polish wheel then the finer one. It is difficult to get mirror finish here (on curved part) however it does not show with tire mounted. The anodising left will show so if you can do it with dremmel.

I MADE A MISTAKE on price as the 3m trizact hookit discs (800, 1000, 3000 wet sand) were a bit more than regular discs so was about $20 more. The good thing about these are if used correct they last a loooong time.

I now have to find a home for the polished wheels, I am thinking to put them on a '90 944 cab. we just got. (then I gotta find a place for the 7"/8" chrome phone dials) Hope this helps, Don.