Painting Wire Wheels

[CatGuy]

I'd like to change the color of wire wheels on my '26 from pale yellow to black. Is that something that I can do by cleaning and prepping the wheel and using either spray paint or brush on Rustoleum.....or is it better to have them sandblasted & powder coated?

[Been Here Before]

Your best method would be to leave the current paint on the wood, sand (by hand not sander) the current paint down, not off, leaving the current paint serve as a primer. And paint the wood spokes black.

Sand blasting wood is bad.

To be honest, never heard of powder coating wood.

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

I'd like to change the color of wheels on my '26 from pale yellow to black. Is that something that I can do by cleaning and prepping the wheel and using either spray paint or brush on Rustoleum.....or is it better to have them sandblasted & powder coated?

Your answer likely depends more on what your goals are. If longevity is your goal,-or if finish quality is your priority, then mediablasting is likely the best way to get the old paint removed. Powderpainting is a great way to coat the steel wheels however many coating companies use an inferior powder so the UV holdout is not that good. Rustoleum (-or any non-catalyzed paint) is about a step below powder painting, however if you want the best, then you need to consider media blasting followed by 2k epoxy, a high-build surfacer, and then a good quality 2k urethane topcoat.

As far as powder-painting wood (-or fiberglass, plastic, glass, etc.), it can be done however a special coating must first be applied that allows the powder-paint to adhere before the powder is melted.

[CatGuy]

My bad. I forgot to say that they are wire wheels.

[Been Here Before]

My bad. I forgot to say that they are wire wheels.

Then by all means, sand blast and paint as desired.

[Etudes10]

I recently painted set of wire wheels. Not a fan of power coating. I had the wheels media blasted and used DTM primer. Two coats of primer, wet and dry 400 or 600 between coats.
Used acrylic enamel, 8 to 1, paint to hardener ratio. Very durable and easily touched up if needed.

[Craig Leach]

Hi Scott,
I prefer powder coating for wire wheels especially if they are rusty or the existing is not real good. Sanding spokes can get old fast.
The powder coater I use primarily doe's patio furniture so they use very good powder as the work they do is in the Az. sun most of the time.
I have had them do a dozen wheels in the last two years and I'm real happy with the results.

I just drop them off & pick them up no need for gloves, respirator or clean up. Then I have time to do things I can't afford to pay someone to
do.
Craig.

[havnfun]

If the current paint is in good/decent condition, I would use a scotch brite pad and a buckets of water with dish washing liquid to scrub them down. Rinse, Dry and spray painted with Rustoleum professional gloss black. No need to spend $$$ sandblasting them If in decent condition.

[South Park Zephyr]

I would suggest instead of dishwashing soap and a scotchbrite, use and abrasive cleaner. Ajax used to be great but then they changed the formula to reduce scratching. Cheap powdered cleansers are the best. I use a product called “scuff stuff” it is available at paint jobbers. It cleans and abrades the surface. It is used to prep automobiles for painting and works quite well

[Ed Fuller]

Powder coat them.

I can't imagine the amount of work it would take to hand sand/scuff and clean wire wheels and either spray or hand paint them.

I had 4 wire wheels blasted and powder coated for my speedster for less than I could have bought the painting supplies for. My labor only consisted of dropping off and picking up my wheels. My local place had them done in a week.

[Tim Moore]

Painting wire wheels can be difficult. I have painted several sets and here is how I do it for good complete coverage and keeping them suspended so nothing touches wet paint:

When the wheel is all ready to paint I brush the inside center and inside where the tube lays then set them aside for a day or more to dry. Next I have a short section of front axle cut off with a spindle attached so it won't flop around. I put a front hub on that and mount the wheel. The axle stub is slid into my engine stand and that keeps everything at a comfortable height. You could put the axle in a vice or build a stand and anchor the axle with u-bolts. Now you can paint from all angles to get the spokes and spin the wheel by touching the tube contact area that is already painted and dry.

Now you either wait a day to remove the freshly painted wheel or take some clothes line and rope around the tube contact area that was previously painted and remove wheel to hang and move on to the next wheel.

This has worked well for me to get the spokes painted completely. You can spray from the outside and inside but can also spray at angles from the hub out and the rim in towards the center if that makes sense.

Nothing worse than finishing a wire wheel and later finding a spoke that didn't get paint in one section and it is surprisingly easy to do that.

Tim Moore

[Allan]

Tim, I use a stub axle and hub to take the wheels too. I do mine on the horizontal rather than in their normal plane, and I do the whole wheel all at the same time. i start at the valve hole and count spokes, spraying all from one angle, then repeat the same operation spraying on the other angle. Then i turn the wheel over and repeat the same process, so the spokes are sprayed from 4 directions.

There will already be paint on the hubs and felloes from this, so spraying them is easy because the fiddly bits around the spoke ends are already done. This also prevents runs, as there is no extra loading around the spokes.

I hang the wheels to dry. To lift them off the hub and to hang them from a beam in my garage, I make a lifting hook for each wheel.
This consists of a 1/2" flat washer with a wire twitched to it and a loop formed in the other end of the wire. The loop passes through the valve stem hole. then the whole wheel can be lifted from the hub with a hook already through the wire loop, and the wheel suspended to dry. The washer on the wire makes as little contact as possible with the wheel. Because I always use spraying enamel for the best gloss and best flow of paint, it is easy to touch up. I can even brush out runs, if they develop, and I catch them in time.

Powder coating is easy. You just have to pay the price. But then there is the problem of touching up. breaching the coating with wheel lug nuts and the breakdown of the coating where laced spokes contact others,

Just my experience. Others will have their pwn experiences.

Allan from down under.

[Ed Baudoux]

Consider using the washers under the wheel nuts that vendors offer. They help keep the paint from chipping around the holes. The holes are very likely enlarged and the wheels flattened out a bit, where they meet the hubs. I've seen a lot of 26-27 T's with little peaks at the end of the lug nuts from the studs bottoming out.

[AndyClary]

Here in California you can have wheels powder coated pretty cheap through Les Schwab tires. If you want black most powder coaters will work with you if you can wait til they have a batch to do. I painted my buffaloes and it took about a third of a gallon to paint 5 wheels. Most of the paint just misses.


Andy

[TRDxB2]

The wheels with a primered when I got them. Am trying for a period look, not modern paint job. So just used some Farm Implement paint, several coats with a good brush - its rock hard. Rust-oleum also has different colors, other than Farm manufactures, as Safety colors.
Some argue that its harder to touch up a powder coat if it gets a chip in it- but isn't a chip against the reason for having it powder coated in the first place? Usd low-gloss on the undercarriage & Used IH white on the wheels - not available anymore - hope I don't gt a paint chip

[DHort]

My biggest problem with powder coating is that they painted the entire wheel. Could no longer get the wheel on the hub because they put a nice thick coat of paint on the inside of the wheel. Lucky I only did one at the time. Had to remove all that paint so the wheel would go on the hub.

They also wrapped the wheel with a fine wire so the inside of the wheel had a fine groove with no paint. I had to paint that by hand.

[ModelTWoods]

My bad. I forgot to say that they are wire wheels.

Unless you went back and revised the title and content of your post, it clearly says WIRE WHEELS. Even my EYES can read that 1

[Dave Young]

I’ve done both ways and have to say that from here on out, powder coating will definitely be my only choice. In fact, I want to change the color on one my cars wheels and will have them powder coated this winter. The main difference is that the powder coated ones do not chip NEARLY as easily as the painted ones. Also, mounting tires is also easier due to how slippery the plastic is. I drop them off, he blasts them with walnut shells and coats them for about $125 each. Chips in black paint won’t show nearly as much in as they do in the lighter colors, but it’s still annoying.

[Allan]

Just for interest, my grit blaster was also a powder coater. The two are a common combination. He would not take in previously powder coated stuff for blasting because if ti was done properly in the first place, it was an absolute bear to remove. He would blast items which were hit with a blowtorch to break down the old coating first.

On tyre fiting, these days most tyre shops have machines which will handle 21" wheels. My man tapes the three lugs before mounting T wheels to save the paint. From there, nothing other than the tyre touches the rim, so the paint/powder coat is never impacted by tools. It's quick, easy, damage free and not really expensive.

Allan from down under.