I've read a bunch of threads and other stuff on the process, and it seems pretty straight-forward. My question is about the interior portion of the wheel...inside the cylinder, if you will...you can see some of that area through the spokes. Most every write-up I've seen shows someone spraying the stuff on with the wheel still on the car and the brakes covered. Now, my wheels are already off the car, so it makes sense to do them that way. But should I flip 'em over and do the insides first? You never see anyone say to do that, but it makes sense that you would have to to hide any silver showing through. For those of you who have used this on your wheels, how did you handle the inside rim issue?

 

i plasti dipped a set of M3 wheels and regretted it.. it looks good for a while but it WILL peel eventually and if you ever decide to remove it from your wheels its a mother fu$$$ to remove! i ended up having to get the wheels sand blasted.. i think the heat from the brakes ends up baking the plastic dip to the clear coat on the alloy... but again this is just my 2 cents.

 

Hmmm...yours is actually one of the few negative experiences I've read. I wonder what the difference was?

 

Actual long term experience instead of exuberance over the immediate results.

 

Define long term... I've seen plenty of people say they looked good after a year. I don't think this has ever been billed as a long term solution in the usual sense.

 

maybe the coating wasnt applied to a deep enough thickness on the wheels

 

+1 on the thickness , the more coats you apply the easier it is to peal off.

 

im just saying what happened to my wheels.. i had the dip on for a couple years and it wasnt easy to get off.. even with a scotch brite pad and some laquer thinner... but again.. just my 2 cents.. the coating looks great when you apply buy with time it gets dull and the brake dust tends to melt into the coating causing a brownish look unless you clean them religiously.. try it out .. whats the worst that can happen.. me personally will never use plasti dip again.. just take the wheels to a good body shop and have them painted or powder coated.. much more durable

 

+1, well stated

 

Why not powder coat?

 

Two main things to keep in mind when using plastidip for coating.
1, multiple heavy coats are required to ease removal later, but the first coat MUST be a light tack coat, also allow 10 - 15 minutes between coats.
It looks orange peely at first, but will flow out smooth.
2, apply a coat of wax to the surface to be plastidip'd, this Will ease the removal later on.
3, plastidip will adhere to any surface. Any masking tape must be removed immediately after the last coat to have a clean line.
4, After cured, any tire gloss product May be used to achieve a semi gloss look.
5, figure at least on can per wheel, do all 4 wheels in rotation, less wait time for tack to get back to the first wheel.
ps, I put 7 coats on my other set of manhole wheels, I ran them for a year, no nicks or peeling.

 

Eventually, if I decide 100% to stay with these wheels, and keep them black, I likely will do just that. I do kinda like the idea that I can "test drive" the wheels in the color I think I want without permanently altering them.

 

OK, so I'm going to do this, and I promise to give an honest report in a year or so, whether I'm happy with them or not. So that being said, to my original question: For those of you who have done this, what did you do about the interior of the rim? Just...whatever spray gets there, gets there? Or did you actually flip them over and do the inside completely? I don't really care about the bits I can't see, but you can see some of that area on the Cup IIs...

 

I did the ones on the Gold "onion" car pic in sig, I sprayed it over the pealing chrome, been on two years now. What I've noticed is they don't clean up well (brake dust), image cleaning rubber, so I respray touch up coats.

Will eventually have them blasted and powder coated, just not in the shark budget as this time

Dave

 

what i did when i sprayed my M3 wheels was i scuffed the inner rim(barrel) with a scotch brite pad and sprayed it with a good quality rattle can semi gloss black paint.. you want to make sure that you tape up the face of the wheel so you dont get over spray on it... then when its dry just unmask the face and plasti dip the face of the wheel and dont worry about the plasti dip over spray getting on the inner barrel.. OR you can tape off the inner barrel with masking tape and some newspaper before you plasti dip the face of the wheel.. this will catch the over spray that gets through.. just make sure you do a good job on the prepping.. as a paint and body guy i can tell you that prepping is 90% of a job coming out good or bad..make sure the wheel is clean of any dirt and oil.. wash them first with soap and water.. dry.. wipe them down with a clean towel and some wax/grease remover solvent like "mineral spirits" .. once dry.. even tho they say you dont have to tape anything off i would still tape off the tire.. its just comes out cleaner.. im telling you from my experience the plasti dip doesnt come off as easy as you might think.... do 1 wheel first complete just so you get the hang of what its gona be like... then if you like it.. do the other 3 ... if not.. go get them PAINTED OR POWDER COATED!!! hahaha just sayin