disassembling wheels...

[yoogene83]

So with my stimulus check coming in this week, i had planned on using it to repair and repaint my wheels back to a silver color...but with things going the way they are, i may just put it in a CD or something, and use 100 for supplies.

Anyways, the wheels are 19" IForged Senekas, 2-piece that need a little TLC. there are about 39 bolts per wheel, and after taking them apart, i'm thinking of sanding off the black paint and trying to get an anodized silver finish and repolishing the lips.

My main concern is, how much elbow grease/asspain will it be to take these apart? and then, how much elbow grease/asspain will it be to get the faces the color i want? I'm planning on spending a lot of time, so that's not the issue, but it's the issues with it coming out right that i'm worried about. Do you have any recommended tools that i should invest in? i'm budgeting around $100-200 max, but willing to spend a little money on tools if need be since you can always reuse tools

anyways, here are the wheels i'm planning on working on...







and this is what i'm shooting for:

[Kittrell]

Christ, thats like taking apart a beadlock!

[SlappyB6]

Airplane paint stripper will take the paint off with little to no effort, you just have to find it. It would at least mean less sanding and easier refinishing.

As far as the bolts, I would contact the manufacturer and find out what the torque specs on the bolts should be. And I would Loc-tite them when you put them back on. Or possibly buy new ones, I'm sure you can find them somewhere, auto parts store or hardware store.

[mxrz]

The torque for the fasteners is usually in the 20 to 26 ft-lb range (but check with manufacturer for sure), and they should be tightened in a criss-cross fashion; 12-6, 3-9... Hand tightened first, then torque wrenched after, in the same fashion. Getting the torque dead on is important, don’t do it by hand/feel.

[yoogene83]

thanks for the tips! i just cross-checked bimmer forums and they mentioned the torque spec as well. Hopefully peter can hook me up

is there anything that would make removing the bolts easier? i would assume after being on the wheels for a while they would probably want to stay stuck...i'm thinking some wd-40, but would that eat away at anything?

[SlappyB6]

WD-40, PB Blaster, Rust Buster...let them soak overnight if you can, they should come off fairly easy unless they're stuck to the paint.

[Capt. Obvious]

Get ready for some serious work, taking apart wheels IS NOT fun in any way. If they're three piece and sealed, put them in the oven at 250 for about 10 minutes to make them easier to get apart if they don't want to split.

Aircraft stripper should take the paint off no problem. Worst case scenario, you can get them media blasted. Personally, I'd recommend spending the money to powdercoat the centers as opposed to painting them (unless you're trying to match a specific color).

When putting them back together, put them back together "dry" (don't use any sealents between the rim pieces (this only applies to 3-piece wheels). Don't forget to use Loc-Tite on the bolts too.

Long story short: get ready for a lot of this

[AUndrRated4]

first make sure your rivet nuts are not spot welded...if they are your sol...my old senekas were spot welded..I would just spray with the barrell on for ease.

[yoogene83]

As far as i can tell, they look like they're free from welds. I'll find out soon enough though...

i'm figuring a lot of wrench time with this project, but with the gf away in korea for the next couple weeks, i figured i might as well do it now since i'm bored outta my mind. I'm debating on whether or not i'm going to PC the wheels as i'm really looking for a brushed aluminum look for the face and a polished lip...we'll see how things go though

[yoogene83]

i'm debating on getting a gold-plating kit and plate the bolts in gold prior to re-assembling too

in the end, i'll probably spend as much doing it on my own as i would paying someone to do it...haha

[A4Dit]

in the end, i'll probably spend as much doing it on my own as i would paying someone to do it...haha

It's much more fun that way though.

[wolfdog]

I don't know why people bother with CDs. You can get comparable rates with ING Direct or another similar account AND you have access to the money. With a CD you will get penalized if you withdraw it before maturity and pretty much render it pointless.

Before I ever put money into a CD I would look into those accounts or a Tax Exempt Municipal Bond Fund. Unlike a CD or ING Direct account, you don't worry about federal taxes (and even state taxes in some cases) with the latter.

[yoogene83]

interesting info! i'll definetly look into that, as i'm all about having my money make me money

[B6Lovin]

aircraft remover is avail. at autozone/pepboys/advanced auto parts... should be really easy to find. i say powdercoat silver and polish the lip

[yoogene83]

aircraft remover is avail. at autozone/pepboys/advanced auto parts... should be really easy to find. i say powdercoat silver and polish the lip

that's what i'm hoping for, but my budget limits the work...

[AudiA4_20T]

I don't know why people bother with CDs. You can get comparable rates with ING Direct or another similar account AND you have access to the money. With a CD you will get penalized if you withdraw it before maturity and pretty much render it pointless.

Before I ever put money into a CD I would look into those accounts or a Tax Exempt Municipal Bond Fund. Unlike a CD or ING Direct account, you don't worry about federal taxes (and even state taxes in some cases) with the latter.

Hmmm Larry we should discuss this stuff when we do the TB

[member]

those silver wheels have a brushed look. the best look for rims in my opinion

[quat]

Definatley get the torque specs, you don't want to end up with a warped set of wheels.

[yoogene83]

Ok, so i went at this since 4pm this afternoon and just wrapped up for the day a few minutes ago around midnight.

Church came by and lent his almighty hand and brain to pull these bitches apart and cleaned up. without him, i'd probably be cursing a storm and spent twice the amount of time doing it. He also has some better pictures for the future DIY i will be posting, but these will suffice for now...

day 1:
pulled the wheels off the car and cleaned them up with some water and sponges. knocked off the center caps and polished those beasts up. They went from this:


to this:


day 2:
then went into the process of pulling them off. Turned out to be an 8mm 12 point socket, so luckily i had picked up both the 6mm and 8mm just in case, and the luck of the draw saved me. I also used my electrical impact wrench to pull them off from the rear. I mean, hot damn, that thing worked like a charm. it was so effortless i thought i could have drank a beer while doing it.




now came the rebuild phase, on Cam and Levi's suggestion, i picked up up some aircraft stripper and went to town.
HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, what a pain in my fucking ass. I've gone through probably 6 coats of this shit and have just gotten through the face, not even the spokes. uugggghhh



so in between waiting for the paint to wrinkle up on the face, i went to town polishing the barrels. I found the PB blaster is a great way to clean up the grime and crap all over the wheels and used my MAG polish and powerball to polish the biches up

From this:


to this:





I got through fully polishing the rear wheels and i'll do the fronts later when i do the other faces.

This is where one wheels stands...


i'm about this -> | | fooking close to saying screw it and sending the faces into powedercoating or just media blasting to the base metal, which looks flipping awesome and the exact look i'm going for...

We shall see if i pick up more of the aircraft stripper to try to soak inside the trash lid....

as of now, i'm about $100 into the project. Spent about $60 at Sears on random tools, and another $50 at autozone and supplies...so far so good...

[yoogene83]

off topic...

my next mod:
http://www.disappearing-car-door.com/

[B6Lovin]

that looks awesome -- stick with it... the finished product looks a million times better than the black.

and that door thing is nuts. too bad it's extra weight lol

[yoogene83]

thanks, it's coming along, but i'm thinking media blasting might be the cleaner way in this endeavor though...i'm gonna try and get some quotes tomorrow to see

[Capt. Obvious]

Media blasting is usually pretty cheap. Especially when you compare the monetary cost to the mental cost of doing all that paint stripping yourself!

[churcH]

genes ultimate goal..



dont tell him i let the cat out of the bag

[yoogene83]

Media blasting is usually pretty cheap. Especially when you compare the monetary cost to the mental cost of doing all that paint stripping yourself!

true, this process is killing my hands, my nose, and my sanity

[Capt. Obvious]

genes ultimate goal..

I approve.

[vdubstreets]

His brother sold/traded the mk3 for a mk5

[Capt. Obvious]

You're thinking of Jeremy's bagged mkV. The car above belongs to Sussanah (Silver Snail), she lives in Toronto.

[3ohAvant]

i hope you took the air out of the tires first.

great job so far. i was going to make sure you have a true 3 piece, and not a 2 piece, a 3 piece will allow you to do this project, a 2, not so much.

i had my faces off in about 30 minutes/wheel,

i sent them in for powder coating.

they did some blasting, then powdered them, for a lil over $50/face.

i used the same hardware, but mine looked pristine. if you're looks bad, then get new hardware, its really cheap!

putting the wheels back. the specs above look about right, but i'd confirm with the mfg. it took about 45-50 minutes to put each wheel back together.

GL on the rest of the project, I did this twice on my last set of wheels : )

[joe.audi]

this will save you allot of time and you wont need as much stripper. take a piece of 320 grit sand paper just rough up the paint without sanding through it then spray on the striper, and after the striper is on wrap the wheel face in plastic so that the striper doesnt dry up and stop working. when wraped in plastic the air cant dry up the striper and it keeps working until the paint is completly off

[yoogene83]

well, damn, too bad i didn't see you guys respond to this thread a long time ago!

anyways, i'm about 20 hours into this project so far and it's so incredibly time consuming. i've gone through about 6 cans of aircraft stripper and will probably be able to get by with 1 more. here's a couple updated picts..



inner spokes are a humongus pain in the butt



got through 3 after 5 hours...


and guess what! they actually look like expensive wheels again. haha

[absolutegtr]

I'm lovin it!

I never understood why people would pay for new wheels and then just paint them black...let alone expensive ones!

[JBM]

For those looking to do this. I would recommend Kleen Strip so you can paint it on and it will be easier to do and cost less.

[darkstar]

i just had mine refinished it did everything myself but the powdercoating that ran me about 200 bucks for sandblast and recoat on my iforged sprints.. Iforged f'ed me and told me they didnt cover the center of the wheel near the center cap since it was chipping! they where 2 years old and the center chipped and faded sooo bad..

[JBM]

I just Duplicolor

[acbaseball186]

i say go for it and good luck!

[yoogene83]

almost there...



the OG's might recognize this pic...

[J3RR3L]

rims look good. doesnt that owner have a toyota truck now?

[yoogene83]

yea, i'm not sure if Mike still has his Taco, but yea, Reznunt got rid of this car back in '04...

[absolutegtr]

wow, that looks sooooo much better