LegacyGT
01-01-2012, 02:31 PM
For some reason the gods of snow are withholding white wintery bliss that Subaru owners dream about, and instead has brought us temperatures in the 50's just a few days before the new year. Rather than get upset at the weather I took advantage of it to get in some work that normally would be put on hold until spring. :idea:
Since the temperatures have gotten below freezing, I have had to retire my extreme performance summer tires and throw on the Blizzak snow tires. Unfortunately there has been no snow to play in yet :awman:
The rims I have my Blizzaks mounted on are the OEM tires that have been demoted to winter tires, so I dont feel bad if I get a bit of curb rash should I push a scoobie drift a bit too far :whistle: The rims have some cosmetic damage, but more importantly after having my black rims on all summer I really like the black on black look much better than the silver on black, so it was time to cue the music and get to work (A-team theme) :coolgleam:
First order of business was to remove the wheels and clean them up. There was a lot of old wheel weight adhesive to tackle and as you may have already seen the wheels were very contaminated with iron. Clean up was done with goo-gone and a plastic razor blade to remove adhesive, then Iron-X to decontaminate, followed up by a claying and one last pass with goo-gone to prep the surface for painting.
The pictures of the car before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-DRtNNgh/1/XL/i-DRtNNgh-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-ThRDgGb/1/XL/i-ThRDgGb-XL.jpg
Old wheel weight goop:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-BJLGB7R/1/XL/i-BJLGB7R-XL.jpg
Now to let Iron-X Do it's thing:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TvvGrG4/1/XL/i-TvvGrG4-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-CT8tLBf/0/XL/i-CT8tLBf-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-7x5pxcN/0/XL/i-7x5pxcN-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-CP8ng2x/0/XL/i-CP8ng2x-XL.jpg
After a long and drawn out (and bloody) battle, things were looking much better:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-kzvcB3r/0/XL/i-kzvcB3r-XL.jpg
Clean wheel compared to dirty one:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-Nt6g5k6/0/XL/i-Nt6g5k6-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-nxw4S97/0/XL/i-nxw4S97-XL.jpg
Now for the painting :hungry:
I chose Plasti-Dip spray for this job after using it on my front grill and getting some really great results. I found it in the hardware store with the spray paint and promptly bough out the stores stock :evil:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-nkwHGwn/0/XL/i-nkwHGwn-XL.jpg
Ready for prime time!
The actual painting process I didn't get a lot of pictures of because I didn't want my camera around to get overspray on it. First thing I did was put on my chemical respirator and I was very glad that I did. Plasti-Dip is really cool stuff, however, it has some really nasty chemicals in it. I didn't notice at the time, when when I was finished and took off the respirator to walk back inside the chemicals about knocked me out. I ended up having to leave my jacket I had been wearing in the garage overnight to air out and not stink up the house.
The painting process went well, but it took a lot of coats to cover up the OEM silver and get the look I was wanting. I found a good application method that worked well for me by applying a heavy first coat (wet) and then letting it dry before layering light coats about 10 minutes apart. I found when painting my grill that you can control the texture a bit by how far away you spray from; since I was wanting a fairly smooth finish I was spraying from about 10'' away. I painted the back side first, then sprayed the fronts.
In all I used up just about 4 cans of Plasti-Dip. I am very happy with the results, and I think for an afternoon's worth of effort it came our really well. The wheels won't hold up to a microscope, but I doubt that anyone would realize this was a rattle can job unless they were really scrutinizing the wheels for some reason.
A few shots of the wheels while curing (they are propped up with the spray paint caps so the bottoms don't touch the plastic I have under them).
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-GPNv3GX/0/XL/i-GPNv3GX-XL.jpg
I used the halogens to help gently speed up the drying process:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-qSBmBSL/0/XL/i-qSBmBSL-XL.jpg
You can see (below) that I have taped off the back portion that comes into contact with the discs so that it will still have good metal on metal contact where it mounts.
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-pwqMb8K/0/XL/i-pwqMb8K-XL.jpg
Finished Shots (before & after)
Before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-DRtNNgh/1/XL/i-DRtNNgh-XL.jpg
After:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-Gq9Jvxd/1/XL/i-Gq9Jvxd-XL.jpg
Before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-ThRDgGb/1/XL/i-ThRDgGb-XL.jpg
After:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-KMHVBqs/1/XL/i-KMHVBqs-XL.jpg
Close up:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TgbwgBS/0/XL/i-TgbwgBS-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TFKjx8P/1/XL/i-TFKjx8P-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-7q25m3t/1/XL/i-7q25m3t-XL.jpg
You can see the light texture
In the daylight I am really happy with how they look, and I think it is a huge improvement from where I started. I will report back on the durability of the Plasti-Dip spray, however, this stuff is really fantastic. I think I will use it in the near future to do some underbody coating and wheel well dressing. It is very versatile stuff.
Lessons learned - I have a few thin spots that look a bit pewter in direct sun that were in difficult to spray areas, but that is splitting hairs. It also takes a lot of Plasti-Dip to get a good thick coat on. Each wheel has 6-7 coats on it, and I used almost 1 can per wheel.
Now its time to go drive around and show off my new look :gidiup:
Im the MAN
Since the temperatures have gotten below freezing, I have had to retire my extreme performance summer tires and throw on the Blizzak snow tires. Unfortunately there has been no snow to play in yet :awman:
The rims I have my Blizzaks mounted on are the OEM tires that have been demoted to winter tires, so I dont feel bad if I get a bit of curb rash should I push a scoobie drift a bit too far :whistle: The rims have some cosmetic damage, but more importantly after having my black rims on all summer I really like the black on black look much better than the silver on black, so it was time to cue the music and get to work (A-team theme) :coolgleam:
First order of business was to remove the wheels and clean them up. There was a lot of old wheel weight adhesive to tackle and as you may have already seen the wheels were very contaminated with iron. Clean up was done with goo-gone and a plastic razor blade to remove adhesive, then Iron-X to decontaminate, followed up by a claying and one last pass with goo-gone to prep the surface for painting.
The pictures of the car before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-DRtNNgh/1/XL/i-DRtNNgh-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-ThRDgGb/1/XL/i-ThRDgGb-XL.jpg
Old wheel weight goop:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-BJLGB7R/1/XL/i-BJLGB7R-XL.jpg
Now to let Iron-X Do it's thing:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TvvGrG4/1/XL/i-TvvGrG4-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-CT8tLBf/0/XL/i-CT8tLBf-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-7x5pxcN/0/XL/i-7x5pxcN-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-CP8ng2x/0/XL/i-CP8ng2x-XL.jpg
After a long and drawn out (and bloody) battle, things were looking much better:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-kzvcB3r/0/XL/i-kzvcB3r-XL.jpg
Clean wheel compared to dirty one:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-Nt6g5k6/0/XL/i-Nt6g5k6-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-nxw4S97/0/XL/i-nxw4S97-XL.jpg
Now for the painting :hungry:
I chose Plasti-Dip spray for this job after using it on my front grill and getting some really great results. I found it in the hardware store with the spray paint and promptly bough out the stores stock :evil:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-nkwHGwn/0/XL/i-nkwHGwn-XL.jpg
Ready for prime time!
The actual painting process I didn't get a lot of pictures of because I didn't want my camera around to get overspray on it. First thing I did was put on my chemical respirator and I was very glad that I did. Plasti-Dip is really cool stuff, however, it has some really nasty chemicals in it. I didn't notice at the time, when when I was finished and took off the respirator to walk back inside the chemicals about knocked me out. I ended up having to leave my jacket I had been wearing in the garage overnight to air out and not stink up the house.
The painting process went well, but it took a lot of coats to cover up the OEM silver and get the look I was wanting. I found a good application method that worked well for me by applying a heavy first coat (wet) and then letting it dry before layering light coats about 10 minutes apart. I found when painting my grill that you can control the texture a bit by how far away you spray from; since I was wanting a fairly smooth finish I was spraying from about 10'' away. I painted the back side first, then sprayed the fronts.
In all I used up just about 4 cans of Plasti-Dip. I am very happy with the results, and I think for an afternoon's worth of effort it came our really well. The wheels won't hold up to a microscope, but I doubt that anyone would realize this was a rattle can job unless they were really scrutinizing the wheels for some reason.
A few shots of the wheels while curing (they are propped up with the spray paint caps so the bottoms don't touch the plastic I have under them).
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-GPNv3GX/0/XL/i-GPNv3GX-XL.jpg
I used the halogens to help gently speed up the drying process:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-qSBmBSL/0/XL/i-qSBmBSL-XL.jpg
You can see (below) that I have taped off the back portion that comes into contact with the discs so that it will still have good metal on metal contact where it mounts.
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-pwqMb8K/0/XL/i-pwqMb8K-XL.jpg
Finished Shots (before & after)
Before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-DRtNNgh/1/XL/i-DRtNNgh-XL.jpg
After:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-Gq9Jvxd/1/XL/i-Gq9Jvxd-XL.jpg
Before:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-ThRDgGb/1/XL/i-ThRDgGb-XL.jpg
After:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-KMHVBqs/1/XL/i-KMHVBqs-XL.jpg
Close up:
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TgbwgBS/0/XL/i-TgbwgBS-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-TFKjx8P/1/XL/i-TFKjx8P-XL.jpg
http://www.smugmug.com/photos/i-7q25m3t/1/XL/i-7q25m3t-XL.jpg
You can see the light texture
In the daylight I am really happy with how they look, and I think it is a huge improvement from where I started. I will report back on the durability of the Plasti-Dip spray, however, this stuff is really fantastic. I think I will use it in the near future to do some underbody coating and wheel well dressing. It is very versatile stuff.
Lessons learned - I have a few thin spots that look a bit pewter in direct sun that were in difficult to spray areas, but that is splitting hairs. It also takes a lot of Plasti-Dip to get a good thick coat on. Each wheel has 6-7 coats on it, and I used almost 1 can per wheel.
Now its time to go drive around and show off my new look :gidiup:
Im the MAN