Jeremy B

If you have the stock 928 polished wheeels that came on the S,S4 models and they are getting alittle tarnished and dull I have found some inexpensive ways to revive them and just wanted to let anyone know and see if anyone else has good products to use. If you rims aren't that bad off Eagle One makes this stuff called never dull that is great. It's wadding in a can that you just rub on and rub off it works like magic. If you rims are pretty grey instead of shiny use a power drill and go to the local hardware store buy a 4" buffing whell attachment ($4.00) a bit that the bufffing whell attaches to ($3.00) and some tri-poly buffing compound ($2.50). just put the buffing wheel together attatch it to the drill use the tri poly compound on the buffing wheel and go to town. it's easier if the wheel is of the car but the tire can stay on. Each wheel takes about an hour. Wehn you down with the tripoly compund use teh eagle one wadding to get even more shine, mine caem out like mirrors for less than $20 for all four wheels.

Jeremy

84 928 S <img src="graemlins/xyxwave.gif" border="0" alt="[bigbye]" />

Ed Ruiz

Just a point of clarification, but all Porsche OEM 928 wheels were painted, and none came from the factory "Polished". YMMV.

Big Dave

I can't figure out what mine are supposed to look like. When clean, I could swear they have a faded mirror look to them.

Jeremy....post some pics!

Ron G.

Wait a minute, I've understood for years that the 928 Flats were all anodized, not painted??!!

Ed Ruiz

I don't recommend the following, but if you were to apply Easy-Off oven cleaner to your OEM wheels, you'd see the PAINT peel off. YMMV.

Robert

Greetings,

Had S4 "Flats" (polished) put on my '89 this weekend and nothing more than a little Mother's Aluminum Polish to get them to shine like mirrors. The previous 2 owners of these rims kept very good care of them with no curb rash whatsoever and the black portions of the rims were almost flawless (in the slots and the recesses for the lug nuts). I have new black lug nuts all around and the center caps are also polished.

The "Flats" look good, run very nice and require very little maintenance (just a wipe...) to keep them looking good.

Rob

Ron G.

Don't think so Ed. A lot of these wheels have been painted in the years since they were produced, but they were anodized originally.

Thom1

The black places are the only places that seemed to have paint on my eleven year old wheels when I did the initial refurb polish. Perhaps there was a clear coat over the aluminum originally. Jeremy’s methods seem good. To add to that, here is a write-up I posted a while back.

Aluminum Wheel Polishing:

For periodic maintenance, I go to the self serve car wash. Pre-treat wash, high pressure wash, brush, rinse. After it dries, I use Duragloss 870 Aluminum Polish. It contains felt that you tear off, and rub onto the wheel. Remove with towel. Buff with polishing wheel, or buffing wheel attached to a drill. Mothers Mag & Aluminum polish is good, but it requires more towels.

For major renovation, I used various abrasives including scotch brite, and sandpaper. I don’t recall the grades, but fine, then extra fine is safe enough. Use medium or course grade as first step for deep gashes. I did most of mine by hand, but a palm sander, or rotating disk will speed up the process. Just don’t create gouges that will take too long to blend back in. Then, proceed to the dry phase above.

I did this to the wheel crests. Next, I painted like the original. I used a dental pick to get the fine edges right down to the horse’s hoof. Painted it with clear aerosol enamel.

There are probably polishing systems involving rubbing, cleaning, and/or polishing compounds and an orbital buffer that would provide less time-intensive, and higher gloss results. I have heard that Eastwood and J C Whitney also have polishing kits. See:
<a href="http://www.eastwoodcompany.com" target="_blank">www.eastwoodcompany.com</a>
<a href="http://www.jcwhitney.com" target="_blank">www.jcwhitney.com</a>

Brake dust will accumulate, and dull that finish. Now that I have installed AXXIS Metal Masters for low dust, they require much less maintenance.
<img src="graemlins/roflmao.gif" border="0" alt="[hiha]" />

Ed Ruiz

[quote]Originally posted by Ron G.:
<strong>Don't think so Ed. A lot of these wheels have been painted in the years since they were produced, but they were anodized originally.</strong><hr></blockquote>

You may think what you want, but originally all the 928 OEM flat-dish wheels were painted. Now, the owner's may have removed the paint to show the metal finish, but that is not the way they came from the factory. YMMV.

BTW, my sources of information on this are: Kim Crumb (PCA's 928 guru) and Larry Reynolds (Car Care Specialist).

Big Dave

So, if my wheels have black paint in the slots and have a dull mirror finish to them, I should be able to bring back that great mirror look with some polishing?

It would be nice to know for sure before I waste a weekend making the wheels more dull.

Thom1

Hi Dave,

Go for it. I doubt any clear coat is left on your wheels. If so, it is not helping now. After I have done a good polish on my OEM Aluminum alloy wheels - same as pictured above, people have said they wished they had my chrome wheels.

PS. I pasted an intro into my earlier post that missed the earlier cut and paste. <img src="graemlins/burnout.gif" border="0" alt="[burnout]" />

BillHapke

Ed, et al:
I am sorry to disagree with the gurus of the Mark, but I think that you will find OPTION CODE: 347 Platimum Anodized Wheels. This is the polished wheels most people confuse with chrome.

Bill Hapke

Ron G.

Bill, I believe that the Platinum anodized were the goldish-colored ones like on the Weissach special edition, with the normal looking ones being simply a clear anodizing.

Not certain about any of this, but relatively sure.

Quinn

The PO on my 87 S4 did something horrible to my wheels, I don’t know what finish they had, paint, or anodized. But whatever it was it’s gone now, they look like they had a nice acid bath, and now they have black covers on them. I was also told that my wheels are Magnesium, and cannot be chromed, is this true, because if they are aluminum, maybe they just need some high speed buffing with a good polish. I have tried cleaning them with regular wheel cleaner to no avail. Any help in restoring these wheels would be gratefully appreciated. Right now I am running ROH wheels out of Australia, they look good but would be nice to have the stock rims looking nice as well.
Thanks
Quinn

Dave A

My '83 has the gold anodized wheels as mentioned by Ron G. At present they are very dull, has anyone polished this type and what method did you use ?

TIA - Dave