Painting wheels

[jmakado]

I know this may not fit seeing how this is a detailing forum and not a painting forum, but I figured someone on here has the knowledge to help me.
I am going to repaint my wheels in my garage. The tires and stems will be off the wheels. They are a cast aluminum wheel with the oem bc/cc paint on them now. I will be painting them a chrome black. I have an idea of what I want to do but was hoping someone could provide guidance/tips and product advise. I will be using rattle cans, no way around it.
My process:
1. Use paint stripper to completely strip the wheels to bare metal.
2. Sand the surface (What grit and process)?
3. Prime. Again, it will be rattle can. Sanding?
4. Paint. This is where I get confused about where/when to sand and with what grit. Also, how long to let each coat cure before the next coat, etc.
5. Clear. Again, how many coats, when to sand, what grit, how long in between coats, etc.

I know they will not be perfect using a rattle can but I want to learn more about the process' of painting and I'm not buying a HVLP gun and compressor just for this!

[Mike Phillips]

working clean is of the utmost importance.

Here's some suggestions,

Remove the paint using an industrial strength paint remover, believe it or not there's an aerosol brand I've used in the past that worked excellent and is very convenient to use. I forget the name but I purchased it at my local PBE store.

You'll need some chemical resistant gloves to keep this stuff from burning your skin, safety glasses should be worn too as you'll probably be blasting these wheels with a high power stream of water at some point to remove all the residue. In the beginning you'll want to use some wire brushes, scrapers, coarse steel wool works pretty good after the paint remove has softened up the paint.

It's icky hard word by the way.

After you get the all the paint off the wheels, you might want to check into having the wheels sand blasted, or media blasted to prep the metal, sanding flat things is easy, sanding curves and tiny components can be difficult and knuckle busting.

Either way you need to get the metal as clean as possible. While you're at the PBE store, tell the paint mixer what you're doing and he should be able to recommend any chemical treatments you'll need and want to wipe the aluminum down with as well as the correct primer.

For that matter he can mix you a high quality grade of automotive paint and put it into a spray can for you.

Before you start this process, visit your local PBE store and make friends with their paint mixer, most PBE stores have a person or two that will work in a back room somewhere, typically with a customer counter, and that's where you would go to have mixed and purchase your paint.

Check them out, all the PBE stores I've ever called on usually have a regular Joe kind of guy who loves his job and has been to plenty of paint schools and training over the chemicals they sell. Many if not most also have a background as a professional painter, if you're nice to them, they can be a wealth of knowledge and first hand experience.

How to locate a PBE store in your hometown

[Paramedic]

Last month I won a GT mountain bike from a drawing at my local bank. It was a purple color which I did not like at all. So I went to my PBE store where I purchase all my Megs products and bough the aerosol "Aircraft Paint Remover". sprayed it on and you could watch the paint burn right off. Works great, but it makes a MESS! Make sure you have a tarp or lots of cardboard down because when the paint strips off it is wet and sticky and will smear all over. I used steel wool to get some of a hard to reach areas cleaned up. Mineral spirits also helped. Make sure you have some of that aswell. After it was all stripped off I made sure I rinsed it real well and used a high quality automotive primer and used the House of Kolor Kameleon paint with the clear coat after and it came out real nice. I completely took that bike apart to get it all painted. Just waiting on the new decals to come from GT and I will end up selling it

Nick

[jmakado]

Thank you VERY much for the replies. I have a much better idea of where to start at least. I'll be going to the paint store tomarrow to chat with them. I'll take lots of pics and make a little Show Off post when I'm done so others can see the process.