The backer board was a short piece of scrap hardwood from my shop, 3/4" x 3/4" x 6" that I wrapped the sandpaper around to keep it flat and not dish out the section of the rim. There will be a small amount of taper and blending necessary since you are removing material from the edge of your rim. I actually found that same video and several others and decided to try repairing this since I had all the tools and supplies necessary on hand.
Thank you for the details. I will have to mull over what I want to do. I certainly don't want to repaint the whole wheel. I would probably have to get some paint mixed by an autobody supply store to match what is on the wheel, and that would
be moderately expensive as either a pint, since I believe the store only does a minimum of a pint, or you can get a custom rattle can for somewhat less. The video I linked to showed that the accordion pleat narrow cylinder dremel sanding (drum) seems to work really well. Since the drum is perpendicular to the shaft, that should make it a lot easier to sand. However, if I were to do this, I think I would have to use spot putty or some filler, since grinding the
edge down flush would make too much of a depression in the edge of the wheel. If I used filler, then I probably don't need to sand very deeply at all.
However, the wheel does get hot from braking and I really question how durable some putty or fiberglass would be......
In addition, since the wheel recess areas are painted black, if one were to do a whole wheel paint job, there would be a lot of masking involved.
Calendyr,
I already said that I found one shop locally that CNC mills the damaged areas, and they estimated $150 without looking at a photo, which I subsequently sent, but the shop was closing for the weekend.
Canadian to US dollar might work if it weren't for the fact that I'm next to Boston, and the cost of living here is like 30% higher than the national average.
As to paint color match...those look (to me) to be '18 Subaru wheels. Check out a Subby dealer, ya might just be able to score a 'touch-up' bottle.
Good luck...
Bill
Many problems with that:
1. There probably would not be enough paint in a touch up kit to repair a wheel. The amount of paint is very minimal.
2. Using a brush to touch up large areas would be very visible and it would look horrible. You need to spray the whole wheel if you want it to look good.
3. I don't think that the colors are available at dealers for wheels. I might be wrong but there is no color code for wheels on the vehicle, so it is unlikelly it is offered.
1) If I was using touch up paint, and I never said anywhere I was, ( I said touch up the damaged area), I would be only doing the damaged area.
2) It appears that the shiny areas of this wheel are not painted but polished metal, which limits using paint, see: YouTube
For a polished rim, you have to take off/down/lathe/grind metal from the entire circumference of the wheel, i.e. remove good and bad metal until the area is evenly machined and flat again; then sand and buff until smooth and shiny.
3) I never said I was looking for paint at wheel dealers. I said I would want to have an auto body paint shop custom blend an exact paint match.
If the wheel is painted then an auto paint shop could indeed make a custom match, but they would have to be able to scan the color on the wheel and subjectively tweak it
(Go to Home Depot some time and bring a color paint chip from your wall and ask them to blend a gallon of wall paint for you.... it's the same idea)
Of course if the shiny area on my wheel is polished, not painted (except for clear coat) then that won't help.
Actually they are 2017 Honda Accord Wheels. I never heard of a car manufacturer making touch up paint for wheels.... Would be nice if they did.
Uncanny resemblance!
I was thinking more along the line that MAYBE a dealer would be able to give some sort of an idea for a paint. Also, again 'a maybe', their body shop might have some ideas.
Don't know if this is even possible...some paint shops (automobile) may have a way to match color like they can do for 'wall paint' (?).
I looked at the photo you posted again and it looks like most of the damage is on what appears to be a polished outside edge. Was the painted area damaged as well? If the wheel is going to need to be machined anyway I would look to sand parallel to the flat edge until the damaged area is removed then gradually taper this out followed by compounding and polishing. You may need to do the entire "pie shaped" area along the top edge. This may result in a thicker looking edge profile where you've sanded deeper into the wheel. I really couldn't tell from the angle of your photo. Below is what my rim looked like after the repair. These were optional wheels for the Ram when I ordered it in 2015 and I took a chance at trying to repair the damage before looking into replacing the wheel because of the cost.
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