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I'm looking for pointers on painting wire wheels. What is a good setup to reach everything at once? Or are they better done one side at a time?

Hi Pat,

Painting the wire wheels was the first thing I did on my coupe.

After I got them sandblasted and primed by a shop that did that, I used many spray cans. I did the back first and went right to the front, then on to the next wheel until they were all done. I gave them 2, or 3 coats, don't remember which.

After 20 years, or so I cleaned them up did some light sanding and painted them again. After another 25 years, I replaced the whole set with a set I had powder coated. The original wheels still look pretty good and much cheaper than powder coating.

Roger

Thanks Roger,

How did you set them up? I was thinking of hanging them .

Pat - It's been 46 years, but I'm pretty sure I mounted the tires on the primered rims and painted them with the tires masked off.

Roger

i put the rims on a 1 1/2 pipe and support it on each end with pipe stands you can push the rims to one end and paint one at a time by rotating and leave on the pipe until they dry . hope this helps

Thanks,

That sounds like good idea.They are getting sandblasted right now by a truck repair shop who is working on logging trailers. He had about 10 truck rims lined up on a 4 X 4 sitting on sawhorses. Similar idea. My rims might be too tippy for that though. The pipe sounds better.

Should I use a touch-up gun for some of the more intricate areas or will the regular gun catch it? The regular gun seemed OK with the primer but the color enamel will be another thing.

I have painted several sets of wire wheels with my regular gun that I used on the rest of the car. I start by painting the spokes from the rear. Then I paint the hub from the front. Next I paint the rest of the spokes from the front. I end by painting the rim from front and back. I always keep the wheel spinning very slow. It has worked for me.

If you have enough space in the shop to allow it, what I did the last time I did this I tried a more complicated set up, and it worked out really well. I bored a hole through two 2x6s and attached them to a cross beam up high. I ran a piece of 3/4 inch pipe through the wheel, with a bunch of duct tape wrapped around the middle so that it was a reasonable "non-slip" fit for the inside of the hub. Then, with a coulpe of 90 degree elbows, I made a pipe crank handle at the end of the pipe, sort of a small scale rotisserie. This allowed standing in the clear, spin the wheel a few degrees slowly, and paint comfortably and without runs. Worked great!

I sent you a photo separately in an email, maybe it will help.

Why have we not seen this hint in the G&D?

I used a version of Pushrods setup for the primer. I will use the sequence described asbove for the paint. See photo on the left.

One thing to keep in mind on any metal that is cleaned with a commercial, high pressure, sandblaster is that it should be sanded BEFORE being primed.
Sandblasting raises small spurs that can stick up through the paint and cause early rust formation.
Also, use a good metal prep before priming. Or acid etch primer.

Necessity of sanding after commercial sand blasting depends on the type of sand used. If #5 (sugar sand) a relatively smooth surface results. If larger sand particles like #4 or #3 then a much rougher surface is expected. Surface roughness also depends on the air pressure used, distance the nozzle is held from metal, if operator moves slowly across or uses a back & forth, up & down motion.

He showed me some truck wheels he had done and I thought they were quite rough. I suggested he use a lesser pressure and whether or not he did they turned out not much rougher than what I get from my cabinet. I gave them one coat of self-etching primer then a coat of lacquer-based high-build. I sanded them down at that point and am going to give them another coat of high-build, sand again then enamel.

I just did the wire wheels on 30 chevy in blasting cabinet with a set of 2 rollers I made that wheel rests on and can be rotated as I go-I've also made jig for engine stand that allows turning of wheel while hand blasting-depending on condition of wheel,as Chipper suggests use medium that does the least amount of damage-I used glass beads or crushed walnut shells

Keep in mind....a good painter gets all the hard to reach spots first.

Thanks guys,

I ended up following the procedure outlined by Back Roads earlier in this thread .

Best thing I've discovered on this subject is Les Schwab. They will sandblast and Powder coat your wire wheels (Any wheel, including big truck wheels) for $20.40 each. This includes all costs and they have a choice of about ten standard colors. Your wheels will look beautiful and there's no way you can do this work for the price.