Hello all!

I have a 3 month old Mini with 16" Black Spoke Rims. My wheel cleaning so far has just consisted of washing the rims with Meguiar's Ultimate Wash & Wax shampoo (my car wash of choice) with dedicated wheel mitts. I want to use something like Griot's Wheel Cleaner to get rid of brake dust and road grime, but i'm not sure if it's safe for my black rims despite its advertising. My rims look great and I don't want to use anything to remove that stunning black shine.

Am I a typical new Mini-owner overthinking it? Do you guys think that Griot's Wheel Cleaner would be fine on my black rims?

For those of you who have black rims, do you use any additional products besides car wash? If so, which ones?

Thanks in advance!

 

There are plenty of how to video's for cleaning wheels, take a look on the Griot's site and you will probably find one there. A couple of other sites will I would recommend looking at would be Autogeek.net and Adam's Polishes.

The biggest cause of dirty wheels has to be brake dust. The best way to take care of that would be to simply change to different brake pads. Do a little research on that and you can find good replacement pads that don't make for wheels full of brake dust. I haven't changed out my pads yet, so I'm still stuck cleaning my wheels quite often.

Having said that, I use four different brushes to clean my MINI's wheels. One to clean the barrel of the wheel, one for the face of the wheel, another for the lugs and hard to get to areas and last one for the tire. Here is a listing of what I use or at least close to it.

http://www.autogeek.net/ezdebrfca.ht...FaFxQgodvkUA3A

http://www.adamspolishes.com/p-395-a...eel-brush.aspx

http://www.adamspolishes.com/p-885-a...nut-brush.aspx

http://www.autogeek.net/mothers-cont...ire-brush.html

As for using Griot's wheel cleaner, that will work just fine. I've been using Adams Deep Wheel Cleaner for the last few months really like how well it works. Just remember that before cleaning your wheels they need to be cool before applying any type of cleaning agent otherwise you may damage the clearcoat and paint. Of course follow the directions on the bottle.

 

Sonax wheel cleaner....I buy it by the gallon as it works like no other. Just refill a spray bottle as needed. I purchase it from www.detailersdomain.com

Then I use Wheel wax.

 

Great, thanks for all the info. I haven't noticed an insane amount of brake dust; it's actually been relatively low compared to what some others have described, so I think Griot's Wheel Cleaner will be good enough (always on a cool wheel, of course Griot's stuff is supposed to be biodegradable and safe on all wheel finishes so I guess I can't go wrong with that.

I might invest in a couple of those cleaners you suggested, too, for hard to reach spots. Thanks.

 

That Sonax looks like it'll last a lifetime in that size That might be a better bang for my buck.