I didn't like the stock silver wheels on my Mini, but then I might be biased a bit because I'm a fan of the black-out mod.
I thought Sterling black would look good and I think they came out great. They change color (if you count black as a color) depending how the light hits it.
Tomorrow I'll have new tires mounted and hopefully I can take some pictures with the tires on the wheels.

Here are some teaser pictures (more to come)

Nice Bert, more pics!

Very nice. How much did the powder coat cost? I was thinking of doing the same thing.

I really want to do this to my wheels in the future. I'm sure we'd all love it if you wrote up a little DIY!

What kind of prep is involved for the wheels? Did they have to be sandblasted down to bare metal before powder coating, or can they just be roughed up with sand paper or scotch brite pads? If so, did you do this yourself or have the powdercoater do it?

A local place did the powder coating for me jetcoat.com. They quoted $75/wheel, which I think is a good price.
They strip the wheel to bare metal (not sure if it sandblasting or using chemicals) and then apply the new coating.
I don't have much of a DIY, since someone else did it for me
All I did is take the tires, wheel weights, valve stems and center caps out.

I forgot to mention that they were able to remove the curb rash from the wheels as well. Now they look like brand new wheels

When I got a set of factory wheels re-powder coated I was told the old finish needed to be chemically removed and then lightly "brush blasted" prior to applying the new powder coating. I think $50-75 per wheel is what it cost for a quality job. Some places powder coat and sand blast but I had to look around to find a place who could chemically strip, sand blast and powder coat.

Stimpy...you're clubman looks awesome with the black rims. I'm actually pretty close to picking up a 2010 MCS in chili red. I'm also going for the black rims and since the dealer said they wouldn't swap, they suggested powder coating instead. After having your rims powder coated, could you possibly list some pros and cons with your experience so far? Thanks!

Thanks for the comment!

Cons:

Pros:

There is a chance that the powder coating flakes off, but that's usually when they didn't follow the powder coating process correctly.
Make sure they strip off the old coating, down to the bare metal before applying the new coating.

If you're interested in seeing the process, check out my Flickr set here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/octaneg...7604116553049/


Curb rash being fixed.


Chemically Stripped


See the powder coating (mine was two color so two passes or twice as expensive per wheel)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/octaneg...7604116553049/

I'm about to do this to my R53. Did you have any problems getting the tires to seal after coating the inside of the wheel? I didn't know if it should be masked off or not but I can see that you didn't.

I've had a set of wheels powder coated for a VW I once had.



Regarding scratching them to reveal metal underneath: Don't curb your wheels and this won't be an issue. No small amount of force is going to scratch a quality powder-coating job.

You also MUST chemically strip all old paint and chemicals from the wheels before coating. After the wheels are chemically stripped and mediablasted, they're baked at several hundred (~450-500*) degrees to push all oils out of the metal. THEN you can apply and bake powder on, otherwise it'll never properly adhere.