Polished wheels?

[Dana Barnard]

A few folks have wheels that are powder coated on the spoke but have polished aluminum on the outside of the rim. How was that done?

I have a friend who is restoring an old Kawasaki, and wants me to try doing this to his wheels. I have always thought the same treatment would look good on my bike (dark blue with dark grey wheels). Any ideas on precisely removing the coating and polishing the aluminum surface? (I think it was Mauri in Germany who did this, amongst others). I could grit blast it off but, I am afraid that in doing so the aluminum would be very rough and never properly polish out.

the alternative for me is a powder coating in a light metallic silver. This might me easier to maintain, eh?

Thanks for any help or thoughts.

[Ricky J]

One of the SoCal powdercoaters (in Chatsworth, was it Andrews?) was going to do that very thing on mine then shoot clear powder over the polished sections. According to them the coating will not be quite so adherent to polished metal but that it would work just fine if a little care was exercised when mounting tires. I ended up going for something simpler because the powder-polish-powder job was going to take too long.

[VikNWill]

in simplified form.....


sand or chemicaly remore coating from wheel lips.

Use finer and finer sand paper 'till you get to 600 grit or so.(Some guys go all the way to 1500 or 2000grit, but I can't tell the difference)

Use metal polish to bring out the shine.

Re-polish every so often.


I keep meaning to do mine, I think the assphault black with silver & polished rims would look nice.

Will

[mnrstrider]

I've wanted to do this from day one, but it sounds like a ton of work, from what I understand it takes a ton of time to do it, and the little nooks on the spokes would be a bitch to get polished. If it was only going to take a couple hours I'd do it, but it seems like it's a project that takes days/weeks.

[Trancer]

I found this pic of a dark blue with polished rim lips. There was a poster a few weeks ago looking for a Futura for less than £3,000 pounds. The one pictured is advertised at £2,995.

[Mauri]

this is my beauty :
http://www.katzeninformation.de/phpB...pic.php?t=8898

[Spence]

Mauri,

Those wheels do look good. So tell us, how did you get them like that?

Oh and those bars aren't standard but don't appear listed in the mods you've done.

[ib12]

Like the double bubble screen. I was considering one but wasn't sure if it made it look too top heavy as they're a large screen anyway. Nice bike

[Mauri]

hi,

well i really do not know how they have been polished. i have let it done through my local dealer. only thing i can say, it was not cheap.
yes the bar is not standard, i have mounted a superbike kit from abm.
take a look here :
www.ab-m.de

[podpeeze]

Don't go spending loads of dosh! You don't need to!
I did mine and all it cost me was a few quid for a large tin of Nitromors paint stripper, some trusty autosol chrome/alloy cleaning paste, a roll of masking tape and some rough grade wire wool. (Those of you affluent types could use a proper buffer )

1, Carefully mask off the area you want to protect with the tape. Use two layers cos if you are not careful you will rub through one with the wire wool.
2, Apply liberal amounts of Paint stripper and leave for around 20 mins. (Enough time for a cool beer )
3, Using hand protection, scrub bubbled surface with wire wool or anything else abrasive. You won't get all the paint off in one go so be prepared to repeat steps 2 & 3 a couple of times. More beer.
4, Once you have bare metal, start applying autosol and rub your fingers to the bone! Again repeat until you arrive at your desired shine.
5 Don't do what I did and leave it there. Get them a coat of laquer! I didn't and the winter got them. Has made a lot of work for me now!

Took me about 7 hours in total from start to finish and that was leaving the wheels on the bike. Would probably be easier taking them off.
Pic below. Make up your own mind but I probably saved myself a good £200!!

Hope this helps
Jon

[podpeeze]

Another view. The rear wheel needs some careful use of the masking tape as there is no natrual line.

[Dana Barnard]

Trancer, my bike is dark blue and I think the picture you found of that bike looks just great with the polished rims. It picks up just enough of the silver in the frame to really balance it. Right now I have those stock, dark grey wheels which just don't look quite right to me. I may just dive in and try it, next week. I think I'll leave the spokes the original dark grey color, like Mauri. If I f*ck it up I'll go with a light metallic silver all over. Yikes!

If anyone in the states wants to sell me some wrecked Futura wheels dirt cheap I'd be interested. I could use them to practice different methods on without too much pressure if I screw up...which I often do.

I'll keep you all posted.

D

[Dana Barnard]

Podpeeze,

That's what I was looking for. Paint stripper rather than abrasive. That should make the polishing go faster. They look great! I'll post a pic and let you know how it went if and when I get it done. Thanks.

Dana

[bikpaintr]

yes the bar is not standard, i have mounted a superbike kit from abm.

I don't understand German but it looked like they only listed a kit for the Mille. Is there a Futura specific kit & what was the cost? What size bar is required?

[Mauri]

@ bikepaintr

yes there is a specific set for the futura, but there is no pic of it.
if you open the abm homepage click on "Produkte" - "Superbikeumbau" - "Superbike Kits" - after that scroll down to "Bestelliste" . This is a pdf file which you have to download.
there you can see the set for the futura. it cost 273 euro + bar.
i use the bar with the code 0229 which is recomand for the futura.


@ dana barnard

if you look to my wheels , you should see that the spokes are not anymore in the original dark grey. i did not like the colour anymore. the colour now is grey metallic.