Melliman

Care to offer a theory?

I'm looking at an attractive and attractively priced '04 Cayenne S - both the interior and body are in wonderful condition save for the wheels - each shows extensive pitting. I had an old 944 with a smiliar problem, but this car seems too young to be experiencing pitting to this extent. It is a Colorado car so it has probably seen its share of winter and salt, but this pitting doesn't seem normal to me.

Care to venture a theory as to what caused this? I called a dealer who stated that pitting wasn't an issue with these wheels. The car has a clean Carfax, and nothing else seems amiss.

Thanks in advance.

Dax

Could just be that the previous owner has used a Harsh acidic wheel cleaner on the wheels which has damaged the lacquer....

Renn 951

Or didn't clean the wheels often, allowing the brake dust to build up and cause corrosion. That's what happened on my wife's BMW, which was previously owned. BTW, BMW OEM pads must be the softest ones known to man - almost every BMW you see on the street, the wheels are always black with dust unless the owner cleans them 2x a week.

cordsig79

they probably used that harsh wheel cleaner and never hosed it off....

quattrotman

Brake dust > kills wheels.

seankrider

Uh... how often does one need to clean the wheels, to avoid this?

Divot

Hang around long enough and someone will offer you free wheels.

I wouldn't let this slow me down if everything else was well sorted and the price was right.

Andy E.

Many years ago due to environmental concerns of over-salinating our rivers with road salt carryoff, Montreal public works started using a coarse combination of sand and crushed stone in an effort to reduce salt usage. This caused an uproar as windshield replacements became common and owners became furious. In addition, this mixture did very little for black ice. The end result of this spicy-mix was lacquer chipping of mag wheels and subsequent corrosion within. I'm willing to bet that Colorado may be using this on their roads as well.