Repainted rims...the process... Options

[6gcSTVT]

So one day this past christmas vacation I had a sunday off and decided to sit down in my garage and sand all of my rims since the paint was chipping on all of them. I decided I was going to do this in the spring but since vermont has been having such nice wether and the fact that my gf left to study abroad for 4 months on the 2nd of january I was bored. So thats where the labor began



I used a flat head screw driver to remove the weights and I labeled them on where i took them off and what rim (1,2,3,4) Well while i'm telling you this do you think i should put the weights back on myself or just go and have them rebalanced? Anyways after 4 hours of sanding with 320 wet sandpaper and numerous distractions like shiny objects they were done.



The next day i also had off so I cleared them off of dust by washing them then using a rag and paint thinner/500 took every last dust particle off the rim and sat in my moms kitchen for 2-3 hours taping them off. Once again there were distractions but this time due to the Sci-Fi channel.



That night I busted out my mettalic graphite Dupli color, clear coat, primer, and a shop light. The painting happened in my basement Mom was so pissed and threatend to get a hotel room for the night bc i made the whole house smell.



After a coat of primer, 2 layers of paint and 2 layers of clear.... TA DAH!!





The color came out darker than I originally hoped but due to the mettalic flakes and the clear coat I'm hoping That the way the second and third final pic look in the light is what they will look like once on the car come this spring.

[kCed]

i have never wetsanded anything before...how do you do it exactly...just use regular sandpaper and wet it?!

wut order or grits should i go in?!

[6gcSTVT]

i have never wetsanded anything before...how do you do it exactly...just use regular sandpaper and wet it?!

wut order or grits should i go in?!

Well my rims were peeling and I had no real deep scrapes so there was no need of a lower grit sandpaper, if you don't know the lower you go the rougher the sand paper and the higher you the finer/smoother you get. Wet sanding is basically the same as sanding but the sandpaper is black, made for metal and you constantly use a spray bottle to apply to the rim and paper while sanding bc the paint and metal will bind up the sandpaper if its not kept wet. for rims its nice to have around a 320 grit metal sandpaper. But if i'm not that helpful here there is a How To at the home page here that says "refurbishing and repainting your wheels" that another member here made up.

oh and if you look at the first picture i uploaded you can see the sandpaper and the orange head of the water bottle..