Sun King

What process should I go through to polish/shine the stock 79 wheels? What's the best?

PIX please... :cheers:

78Vette-SA

You'll get different responses to this but I think majority of us use MOthers or SimiChrome or Wenol.

I used Simichrome and bought a $10 buffing wheel kit for a drill from Sears. IN about an hour they were shining nice. Could have gone another round and really shined them up more.

Before I washed them off:

guppie

Mothers for me :cheers:

78pace

I started using mothers with good result. now my 13 yr. old son has been working with a friend all summer who owns a detail shop.before a car show my son used the wheel acid from the shopon my aluminum rims . sprayed it on , left it for about 3 seconds and rinsed. could not believe the results they look brand new.I can find out what the product is. by the why my son just bought his 1st car. a 73 nova rock solid but needs tlc. not a vette but at least a chevy. and he paided :party:

battsup

I also got a job at a dealership this summer and ill try to find out what brand that stuff is, ill also try to find out about the new car smell.

Magnum '82

The off the shelf goodies sush as Mothers, Simi-chrome, etc, are just meant to "finish" up an already good surface. This is good if the metal is already quite smooth, but if you are after a "serious" shine you will want to use some professional products from a metal polish supply shop. If you want a mirror finish, you will need to sand out the tooling ridges first(which most factory wheels have) and then polish. It just depends how serious of a shine you want. I got my supplies at a car show. I bought the buffers along with the different compounds(brown stick for first cut and white for final cut). After that, the Mothers etc, work great for a touch-up. Like I said, it really depends on how much of a shine you want. If all you want to do is remove oxidation, then off the shelf products will get it done. Polishes are just some paste with abrasive suspended in it, that you drag across the surface to "cut" away the surface with. Some are more abrasive than others, like different grit sandpapers.

moosie982

Hi, I use some Hot Rod stuff,,,,,,,ZOOPSEAL, from Zoopseal.com, pricey, 140.00 bux but worth it, sorry no pictures,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,yet, the wheels outshine the rest of the car now :yesnod: so,,,,,peace to ya'all BYE, Craig :seeya


[Modified by moosie982, 2:13 PM 8/10/2003]

Nomad78SA

I bought a aluminum wheel polishing kit from Eastwood products. I used it today for the first time. @ of my rims I had already started sanding them down with sandpaper 320, 400, 600. The other 2 I started from scratch, just the Eastwood stuff. I have only hit them with the metal cutting rouge so far so I have no finished pics. I will post a couple of pics later.
Neil in Tenn



[Modified by Nomad78SA, 7:48 PM 8/10/2003]

Glensgages

I tried EVERYTHING on my aluminum wheels, which were in TERRIBLE condition, although the car had been babied and garaged with only 11,000 miles on them. The clear-coat had shrunk, peeled, turned Yellowish-Gray,... :U :U :U THEN, it came to me, in a single word: CHROME!!!!! :thumbs: :thumbs: :thumbs: Sorry, no pix (Hell, no camera, either!!!)

Sun King

All good stuff, THANKS! :cheers:
I'm curious about the 'acid' vs. that kit. It seems that polishing the wheels is just like refinishing the paint... hmmm... could I compound the alloy???

moosie982

compounding the "alloy" is actually polishing the wheel, the finer the grit, the finer(shinier) the shine. but more intense labor-wise :yesnod: have fun,,,,,,,,,,,,,,peace,,,,,,,,,craig :seeya

Viken

Wheels on my car were pretty wasted. Started by going through several different grits of rolloc discs (sp? they're made by 3M). That scratched 'em up good and helped to get out the deep pits. Then once I was satisfied, went on with some Meguiar's I believe, and 4,000rpm buffer. Takes me just over an hour per wheel. Two done on one side so far. I can try get some before and after pics up if anyone's interested.