Need help polishing rims

[c91bse7]

Ok I have been polishing the lip on a set of rims I have. Three of which are fine , one how ever has some pretty good curb rash. My question is what's the best way to make it less noticeable I know it won't go completely away , but any advice would be helpful.

[daovangphotos]

What is the finish on the rims? Polished? Clear coated?

[c91bse7]

What is the finish on the rims? Polished? Clear coated?

I'm going to polish them and they had the factory clear coat I guess from Honda.

[90ACCORDLXGUY]

Well if you are taking off the clearcoat then just use a file and sandpaper to get most of it back to smooth.

[daovangphotos]

Without taking off the clear coat, you will not be able to get rid of the curb rash (in my experience)

I believe rim repair shops can repair curb rash rims without removing the clear coat and get it looking as good as new.

I just dont know the method they use.

[Dobermann]

The damaged area has the clearcoat gone already. Think of the concrete as an EXTREMELY quick and overprecise abrasive.

Could you show us a picture of your rims? Some you might be able to do a small area, others you may just be better off refinishing all of it.

I polished my wheels. You may not want to be this thorough, but still.

I'm posting a DIY on my rims soon, due to the enormous amount of requests.

Heres a snippit of the stuff, I jacked it from MR thread

So I have been busy refinishing my blades. I'm not sure I wanna sell them anymore. Heres some pics from the process.

Stock finish



Rash


No rash.














I'm guessing the result is roughly 30-40 hours per wheel, and ALOT of emery cloth, 400, 1000, 2000, Mothers Aluminum and Mag polish, and then Mothers billet.



Thats only 1 polish on it. If I do a few more I will get a much clearer reflection.

[YK86]

^Nice job indeed. I had a set of fat fives for my Acura EL that I polished too and like you, I had to spend countless hours doing each rim until I had it looking the way I wanted. The wetsanding and sanding the sides of the spokes was killer for the fingers as it was all done by hand. Getting the clear off wasn't too bad as I used paintstripper to get the bulk of the clearcoat off and a sander to smooth out big gouges. I only found 1 pic of the progress half way through so it doesn't show much.....I wish I took more pics (car was sold last year).

[c91bse7]

mine were worse then that, i sanded it out best i could pics will be up in in a few i didnt get any before pics. i think im just gonna use it as a spare.

[honda2014]

This is a pretty good thread. Bump!

[AAPOQ]

I hope you guys are wearing respirator protection while sanding aluminum. Or any surface for that matter...

Edit: Nvmind, just saw how old this thread was...

[c91bse7]

This is a pretty good thread. Bump!

This is a pretty old thread....

May as well put up a pic , this isn't the bad one but this is how it turned out

[mitsubishiv5]

Without taking off the clear coat, you will not be able to get rid of the curb rash (in my experience)

I believe rim repair shops can repair curb rash rims without removing the clear coat and get it looking as good as new.

I just dont know the method they use.

They actually remove the clear,.in most cases they usually do a full recondition of the wheel since you have to cut the clear to get to the damaged metal.

[DanCan]

I was also doing this last year, I just did a quick job on them. I only got as far a 400g, but they look way better than they did with the clear all peeling and flaking. I wanted to keep going through the steps all the way to polish, but its on the back burner now.

[steelbluesleepR]

The damaged area has the clearcoat gone already. Think of the concrete as an EXTREMELY quick and overprecise abrasive.

Could you show us a picture of your rims? Some you might be able to do a small area, others you may just be better off refinishing all of it.

I polished my wheels. You may not want to be this thorough, but still.

I'm posting a DIY on my rims soon, due to the enormous amount of requests.

Heres a snippit of the stuff, I jacked it from MR thread

I did my old 10th anniversary wheels this same way, then finished with a mothers polish ball on my drill:

[Scolirk]

I'm guessing the result is roughly 30-40 hours per wheel, and ALOT of emery cloth, 400, 1000, 2000, Mothers Aluminum and Mag polish, and then Mothers billet.

I think I'm going to try this out on my own rims, but I'm worried I'll polish the rims really well, yet still have shitty looking centre caps. Any tips for restoring the caps, or are OEM bolt caps interchangeable with newer Civics?



Pic related, I've got 7 of these but they are in rough shape.