has anybody painted their stock wheels black? i'm kinda thinking about doing it and i wanted to see how it would look on my car. i have a red mini.

 

You can see gloss black S-Lites in my gallery.

 

I haven't done the mod myself, but doing a quick search, I found this pic in another thread. http://https://www.northamericanmoto...ainting+wheels

There are other threads too that talk about using Dupli-Color...



Leaving the lip polished or silver is a nice touch too

 

black wheels on red mini with white top.. hmm black won't look as good as whites on yer car, to me at least..... welcome to the forum.. (saw some pics on the bimmerforums)

 

It's incredible-

 

This sharp looking MINI belongs to Mark, NAM user ToBFree. I took this photo a couple weeks ago at a local meet.

 

yeah i thought about that too..... i just really like black wheels for some reason. :( i guess ill photoshop and see how it looks before i do it.

hahaha how funny. i'm always on bfc but decided to check this out

 

i love it

 

I was thinking about painting just the spokes black. (Please no mention of the temporary front bumper. I have the Aero coming in.)

 

TurboMini: Did we meet in the wash bay last spring at the Dragon? I've seen the electric blue wheels there before. Quite nice!

I love that flat black accents on the black too. But now having seen there are other black S-Lites running around, I think I may have to concede it is time for change again.

Cooper99, yur just too nice. Thanks though!

 

I agree with Cooper...I too saw Mark's MINI at that meet & eat, it looks great

 

Looks Awesome!!!

 

How did you prep the wheels for the painting, and what type of paint did you use? Appreciate the info

 

I bought a set of used s-lites from a fellow club member and refinished them myself in black. I know that several people have used the Duplicolor wheel paint with success, but I had terrible results with it....could not get it to cover evenly and ended starting over after doing one wheel.

I HIGHLY recommend VHT Polyeurethane Wheel Paint. I used the Satin Black and got it from Summit Racing online. It has held up well and went on very evenly and looks great.

 

Here's my post from elsewhere here on NAM in '06 - It was easier to cut and paste.
I will say that I just put them away for the winter with worn and cupped KDW's with 27,000 miles on them (3 summers) and the painted wheels still look decent. Each spring I took poilsh and the smaller Mother's ball to them.

Here's a pic from early October just before the last car show of the year. They still look nice. The tires suc though and came off one day later.

 

jaegirrl,

You are lucky you live in Santa Clara! See my post about the wheel painting I had done at Wheel Techniques in Santa Clara -- highly recommend them.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ics+web+spokes

Good luck!

Jim

 

I took my webspokes to a powdercoating place and had the centers custom colored (I bought my own powder and took it to them). Went with a silver / bronze that is a bit darker than the normal anthracite silver centers to pull out the brown in the pepper white...

 

I spent at least 1.5 hours per wheel... sanding off any residual brake dust. The webspokes are nice for this as you can separate the centers from the barrel and get only the centers colored to retain the polished lip.

I'm a fan of powdercoating for wheels as it is a more durable finish than paint, but I remember talking to the owner of the electric blue with the EB webspokes, shown above, at the Dragon in 2008 and he was very happy with the durability of his painted wheels.

I paid about $70 per corner for powdercoating of the centers (when I supplied the powder). That included prep work (he sanded everything to get good adhesion), a coat of color powder and a coat of high-gloss clear to seal.

 

Hi all, great thread. I've got a Hot Choclate Clubman S with factory silver
5 spoke wheels. I've been looking at gold or bronze wheels but haven't
found any that I'm crazy about. I have a left over set of S-lites from my
05 S and won't hurt to try and paint them. I keep my track tires on them
so they don't have to be real slick.

 

Go here: http://www.nicindustries.com/prismatic_powders.php

They make custom powdercoat colors in small batches to order. I think you need at least a few pounds to fill a powder gun well, but you can get all sorts of colors and finishes.

Then you find a local powdercoater to finish your wheels for you. Don't forget to get a clear coat over any metallic powders (your powdercoater should have a clear in various shines to suit your taste... you don't need to order that one).

 

15" Rocket wheels that I use for the winter. Done with Duplicolor Wheel paint in my garage. I've done 4 different sets of wheels now over the past few years on various cars with the Duplicolor, and have been happy with the product.

 

Bumping this up. I like what you did here, what was your procedure for masking off the part you didn't paint?

Thanks.

 

I bought a set of polished webspokes off of a fellow member that had been powdercoated clear. A tire place ruined the powdercoat on one lip so I decided to split them apart and redo them...I detailed the process in this

thread

I do plan on painting my bridgespoke 16" winter wheels satin black sometime soon though...probably gonna do it after the winter though so I can dismount the tires and do it right.

Since that thread i've also repainted my bonnet stripes white with gold edges to match the lip of the wheels and painted them on the bumper too...



It's dirty in that pic lol. I painted the chrome trim graphite grey pearl as well...

 

If you get a quote from this place (Wheel Techniques) let us know how much they charge to powdercoat web spokes (centers) in flat black, please post. I want to do the same to the extra set of web spokes I have. BTW: here is a post of flat black web spokes and they look very nice. The guy did it himeself with black Rustolium BBQ grill paint from Home Depot.https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...053-post4.html

Thanks,
Felipe

 

Thanks! Blue painters tape for most of it. But I used vinyl electrical tape that allowed me to do a better curve around the edge of the spokes where it wasn't a straight line. I've never had good luck with trying to curve the wide blue painters tape... Up close you can see some imperfection, but from 5+ feet away, it looks "acceptable", especially for snow wheels for me.