builthatch
02-18-2011, 11:54 PM
my wife's '07 Si, she's got 70k on it. she has had the car since new - i wasn't aware of detailing inner wheels at the time she got the car (like i did when i got my '08 MS3 in '08) and have never cleaned the barrels other than getting in them with the ez brush when washing it. she's only had one set of tires on this car other than the OE ones, but there were several areas with wheel weights and/or wheel weight adhesive. that's because the second set of tires she had were TERRIBLE and in an effort to try to quiet them down and compensate for the terrible construction i had them rebalanced at least once.
the time has finally come for new tires - no more torture with these noisy vibrating piece of crap Kumho ASTs. Yokohama envigor avids are going on. so in prep for the new tires, i wanted to finally attack the barrels of these wheels.
passenger side -
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w152/builthatch/23529c07.jpg
driver side -
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w152/builthatch/aeefd936.jpg
i apologize for the HORRENDOUS pictures - i had to use my phone because my wife took my camera for a show tonight. the lighting was rough and i was rushing so i could get back to cleaning them. oh and of course i didn't take befores. trust me, they were bad. i didn't pay too much attention to the back of the spokes except where they meet the barrel as this area is somewhat visible from the front.
the process was to lift/scrape the weights off with a plastic scraper. then take a toothbrush and brush mineral spirits on the adhesive, wait a little, then scrape. after each cycle of this, when there was just the minimal adhesive residue on there, i'd wipe it with prep all (bootleg version of prep sol) adhesive remover on a paper towel until it was gone.
then, i'd spray both sides with p21s gel and let dwell for several minutes, like 10-15 or more. i had a bucket with hot water and dawn, and a long handle synthetic green bristle brush, a boar's hair lug brush and the ez detail brush (old version of the daytona). i'd scrub the wheels with the green brush, making sure the bristles hit the bases of each spoke. there was massive amounts of stuck-on little rocks and asphalt so at this time i picked that off with my nails. i brushed the tires and wheel faces, hits the lug holes, stem hole, and used the ez brush on the spokes.
where there were still pieces of black from the stuck pieces, i hit them with mineral spirits and rubbed them away with paper towels. the bases of the back of the spokes didn't come out too easily so i sprayed each spot with duragloss wheel cleaner. it's slightly acid and when agitated is pretty aggressive. i used the lug brush for that agitation.
then i hit the wheels with optimum power clean, full strength, and let it dwell a bit, then sprayed down with warm water.
i let the water run off, and dried the barrels with paper towels. sounds crazy but it works just fine.
i then used optimum compound on a wolfgang "german" oval pad, on the yellow firm side, and rubbed the barrels well. a lot came up from this process...the foam was dark gray when i was done (cleaned up perfectly though with dawn, back to bright yellow).
i then wiped down the barrels with 50/50 IPA and then applied opti-seal with the other side of the wolfgang pad.
it was A LOT of work but they appear to be almost 100% perfect from the outside when installed on thre car. it took me, all in all, about 3.5 hours to remove them, clean them, and reinstall. i probably could have cut off an hour by not being so exacting with them but i never detail anything half-assed. that is why i only detail exotics aside from my personal vehicles - i can't operate at anything less than 100%.
the time has finally come for new tires - no more torture with these noisy vibrating piece of crap Kumho ASTs. Yokohama envigor avids are going on. so in prep for the new tires, i wanted to finally attack the barrels of these wheels.
passenger side -
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w152/builthatch/23529c07.jpg
driver side -
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w152/builthatch/aeefd936.jpg
i apologize for the HORRENDOUS pictures - i had to use my phone because my wife took my camera for a show tonight. the lighting was rough and i was rushing so i could get back to cleaning them. oh and of course i didn't take befores. trust me, they were bad. i didn't pay too much attention to the back of the spokes except where they meet the barrel as this area is somewhat visible from the front.
the process was to lift/scrape the weights off with a plastic scraper. then take a toothbrush and brush mineral spirits on the adhesive, wait a little, then scrape. after each cycle of this, when there was just the minimal adhesive residue on there, i'd wipe it with prep all (bootleg version of prep sol) adhesive remover on a paper towel until it was gone.
then, i'd spray both sides with p21s gel and let dwell for several minutes, like 10-15 or more. i had a bucket with hot water and dawn, and a long handle synthetic green bristle brush, a boar's hair lug brush and the ez detail brush (old version of the daytona). i'd scrub the wheels with the green brush, making sure the bristles hit the bases of each spoke. there was massive amounts of stuck-on little rocks and asphalt so at this time i picked that off with my nails. i brushed the tires and wheel faces, hits the lug holes, stem hole, and used the ez brush on the spokes.
where there were still pieces of black from the stuck pieces, i hit them with mineral spirits and rubbed them away with paper towels. the bases of the back of the spokes didn't come out too easily so i sprayed each spot with duragloss wheel cleaner. it's slightly acid and when agitated is pretty aggressive. i used the lug brush for that agitation.
then i hit the wheels with optimum power clean, full strength, and let it dwell a bit, then sprayed down with warm water.
i let the water run off, and dried the barrels with paper towels. sounds crazy but it works just fine.
i then used optimum compound on a wolfgang "german" oval pad, on the yellow firm side, and rubbed the barrels well. a lot came up from this process...the foam was dark gray when i was done (cleaned up perfectly though with dawn, back to bright yellow).
i then wiped down the barrels with 50/50 IPA and then applied opti-seal with the other side of the wolfgang pad.
it was A LOT of work but they appear to be almost 100% perfect from the outside when installed on thre car. it took me, all in all, about 3.5 hours to remove them, clean them, and reinstall. i probably could have cut off an hour by not being so exacting with them but i never detail anything half-assed. that is why i only detail exotics aside from my personal vehicles - i can't operate at anything less than 100%.