ASA AR2's pitting/staining problem
 

I had these wheels put on my MINI right after purchase and have waxed the wheels in the late fall and clean them at least once a week. I am now noticing some pitting and/or stains on all 4 wheels. I'm not sure what is causing this. Obviously living in the north with heavy road salt, snow and general grime is hard to keep up with but I wasn't warned that these wheels aren't meant to endure winters. :cry:

Anyone else experience this problem or have any solutions? I have only used prima car wash and soft wheel brush so far. Thank in advance for any input.

I use Wheel Wax on my rims which seems to work better than regular body wax, but my real solution was to keep my old rims for winter use with snows and a new set of Minilites with summer tires. Is the staining from salt or is it dark brake dust?

Normal wax doesn't hold up under the temperatures induced when the brakes get hot. Supposedly wheel wax can. I treated my winter wheels with both Wheel Wax and Prima Wheel Armor and they seem to clean up pretty easily still.

Thanks for your replies. I have only used regular body wax on the wheels with a spritz of hydro with each washing. Looks like it will be another call to Heather at DP for the wheel wax and wheel armour.

Its hard to determine what is causing the the marks. They are black marks but then again when you combine salt with road grime, snow and slush and brake dust... its one big, fat mess. I didn't have any problems prior to the bad weather. Brake dust would wipe right off.

Hindsight being 20/20, I wish I had kept my oem wheels but didn't really have the space to store them and figured I'd be bad about having them switched each season. I am definitely regretting the decision now.

I have never had this kind of a problem with any alloy wheels before. Even the center of the wheel where the "ASA" name is located is discolored and pitted. I'm going to try some diluted Simple Green tonight to see if it will help.

Any other suggestions would be appreciated.... geez I love this car but it sooooooo high maintenance compared to others of owned!:impatient:

Salt would be the primary cause. I also heard Rejex will work from another NAM member. I have not tried it yet.

Can you take some good pix and post them? Lets see what were working with.

My process for preparing the wheels to go on the car is to clean the wheels with dishsoap, then clay, then the wheel wax and wheel armor.
When I store the wheels they're treated the same but just get regular car wax and are stored in some tire totes.