Has anyone ever stripped the paint off of their stock FD3S rims? I did this to my old rims and they came out great and I could get them mirror shine with polish. I'm curious if the FD3S rims will come out the same way, or if they will be all rough and ragged after the paint is stripped off them.

 

just about to do it to my rims...i'll let you know how it turns out.

 

I too would like to see what happens afterwards. I'm lookin forward to your results, eastondle.

 

Well on my old rims, everything practically peeled off and it was bare metal ready to be polished. But I know on the mkiv rims (I own an mkiii supra) they turn out very rough metal, and have to be sanded HEAVILY to get smooth, and THEN they can be polished.

I just want an alternative to the stock silver FD rims, and wasn't sure if these can be polished as-is.

 

yeh i would like to know too. i'm about to get started on my oem wheel painting project. im gonna paint them black and try to make somewhat of a polished lip on it. what did u use on ur old rims to strip the paint?

 

Paint stripper lol. You can get it at home depot/lowes/paint stores, practically anywhere that carries paint products. Just 3-4 big cans of paint stripper and some sandpaper. I suggest you wait for results from someone else first though, because I'm not sure if the FD3S rims are smooth or rough underneath. If they're rough, it will take around 10 hours per wheel I believe (That's how long it took someone to do mk4 tt wheels, they were very rough and had electric buffing eqiupment too!). eastondle let us know how it goes, I'm here if you have any questions about it, I've walked a few people through it before.

 

alright guys, i've begun doing the lips and the metal is indeed rough underneath, unless someone else sees differently. its not too bad. i think in total i've spent about 3 hours or a lil more making the lip portion smooth. thats just making it smooth though, i'll tackle the mirror finish after i finish smoothin out the other 3 wheels. thats what its lookin like for me. if someone else gets it smooth after the stripper than i must've done somethin wrong. i'll keep u guys updated on these bad boys. hopefully with a lil elbow grease i can have them done fairly soon.

 

Nope I doubt you did anything wrong, that's just the way some rims are. Supra MK4 wheels are the same way, and require lots of sanding and buffing before they can be polished.

Can the stock rx7 wheels be polished as is?

 

can the wheels be polished w/o stripping the paint? im not quite sure im understanding ur question. im pretty sure u can. u started sanding one before using the stripper, and it was being to polish up a lil. i just found it easier to strip the paint and have one less thing to sand. also something very helpful is a wire wheel. it doesnt make the surface completely smooth, but w/ a high powered drill, its workin well for me. i'm not trying to make the face of the rim super polished because i'm painting them black but the lip is a pain. there are some corners that are just impossible to get it, thats the only thing that may take a while for everyone else's info. im gettin there though. just these corners. bah

 

What grit sandpaper should I use on the wheels?

I just want to polish them, but I don't want to strip the paint from them. I'm gonna have PLENTY of time to do them so whichever route will make them look the best and be the cleanest I'll take, although stripping the paint and spending 10+ hours on each wheel is a little far fetched for me .

 

well there's really no difference in stripping the paint, or polishing them w/ the paint on. i mean, u really can't just polish them with the paint still on there, it still has to be sanded off so u might as well strip it, if not you can still just sand the paint, its just more layers to be sanded. i used a coarse and fine wire wheel to knock down some of the roughness. it didn't make it completely smooth, but took a lil less effort in sanding to get smooth. i've found 80 grit aluminum oxide sandpaper works well after i use the two wire wheels. after that some 180 to smooth it up a lil more. all of this is dry sanding. i'm just finishing up smoothing out the lips on my wheels. after i've got them smooth, then i'm going to wet sand and polish it up more. essentially, you could use the wire wheels to get the paint off and the wheel is some what polished then, but it still has the rough look to it. it could be polished from there, but i personally don't like it for the simple fact its not smooth. hope some of this madness helps

 

I got my rims today, and I'm debating wether or not I should even do anything with them. They are practically mint condition. 1 is slightly dirty, but the other 3, there is no curb damage whatsoever, no clearcoat peeling, no discoloration, and they are extremely shiny. Mounted them in like 10 mins . I'm just wondering if I should even polish them or not, they look so good already.

 

this my help
http://www.silverbulletrx7.com/wheels.html

 

That's what my rims currently look like.

 

Would you mind posting up a pic of how the polished lip is coming along? I'm curious to see what it looks like.

 

sure thing, i'll post them later tonite, i'll hafta go take the pics, but so far so good,

 

i went ahead and made a new thread guys on my lil project. heres the link:

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...42#post4628242