[GMCnet] Are Alcoa wheels clear coated?
Larry and Cheryl Dilk
My Alcoa wheels have been neglected by me for 5 years. My very feeble attempts to polish one produced very little results. A professional wheel repair/polishing company needs to know if they are clear coated to give me a price. He said if coated the coating must come off, wheels polished then recoated. This costs alot more. I suspect they are coated.
--
Larry Dilk
Indianapolis, IN
76 Eleganza II
Patterson 455,Turbo City TBI,
Just LOVE It!
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Armand Minnie
The polishing kit that they sell has a cleaner followed by an abrasive polish, followed by a sealer. I don't have the cleaner but I do have the polish and sealer. If their wheels were clear coated I doubt that they would have you use an abrasive polish. I got the stuff from Applied GMC who sells Alcoas - I have Eagles.
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Armand Minnie
Marana, AZ
'76 Eleganza II
TZE166V103202
http://www.minniebiz.com/gmcmotorhome
use the forum - it's easy
Dennis Sexton
Larry
No Alcoa's I know of were factory clear coated.
Nylic coating was sometimes used by GMC owners.
Dennis
GMCNUSA wrote on Fri, 07 October 2011 18:27
> My Alcoa wheels have been neglected by me for 5 years. My very feeble attempts to polish one produced very little results. A professional wheel repair/polishing company needs to know if they are clear coated to give me a price. He said if coated the coating must come off, wheels polished then recoated. This costs alot more. I suspect they are coated.
--
Dennis S
73 Painted Desert 230
Germantown, TN
Billy Massey
bdub
On Fri, Oct 7, 2011 at 6:27 PM, Larry and Cheryl Dilk <lwd...@msn.com> wrote:
>
>
> My Alcoa wheels have been neglected by me for 5 years. My very feeble attempts to polish one produced very little results. A professional wheel repair/polishing company needs to know if they are clear coated to give me a price. He said if coated the coating must come off, wheels polished then recoated. This costs alot more. I suspect they are coated.
Larry and Cheryl Dilk
Billy Massey wrote on Fri, 07 October 2011 20:19
> No. They are not coated. Tha's why they look like they do after a few years.
>
> bdub
>
> On Fri, Oct 7, 2011 at 6:27 PM, Larry and Cheryl Dilk <lwd...@msn.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
Thanks to everyone for the answers. Since they are probably not coated the polishing company will not charge as much. He said the top price for noncoated wheels is around $100 per wheel. Does it take that much time for a professional to polish them? I am not a chrome and shine guy so I never bought "mags" when I was young all my $$$ went to speed equipment. My wheels are not pitted just dull and neglected and the rallys make me ashamed of my neglect of the nice wheels. What amount of time should I anticipate it requires for me to polish one wheel?
--
Larry Dilk
Indianapolis, IN
76 Eleganza II
Patterson 455,Turbo City TBI,
Just LOVE It!
Rob Mueller
It's hard to say how long it will take to polish your wheels as it depends on just how dull they are.
If I were you I'd drive the GMC over to the polisher and get him to give you a written quote to polish them.
Once you have that you can click on the link below and watch the video to see what it takes to polish aluminum:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7VsHwx0zmM
If you look to the right you'll see a bunch more videos that you can watch.
If you decide to give it a go yourself you can then click on the link below and order the kit:
http://www.eastwood.com/eastwood-buffing-kit.html
Also Harbor Freight sells a kit for less:
http://www.harborfreight.com/14-piece-aluminum-polishing-kit-98707.html
Polishing dull wheels IS a PITA! However, if you face that up front and realize it's going to take you quite awhile you can do them
one by one and save yourself a few bucks!
Regards,
Rob M.
-----Original Message-----
From: Larry and Cheryl Dilk
Thanks to everyone for the answers. Since they are probably not coated the polishing company will not charge as much. He said the
top price for noncoated wheels is around $100 per wheel. Does it take that much time for a professional to polish them? I am not a
chrome and shine guy so I never bought "mags" when I was young all my $$$ went to speed equipment. My wheels are not pitted just
dull and neglected and the rallys make me ashamed of my neglect of the nice wheels. What amount of time should I anticipate it
requires for me to polish one wheel?
--
Larry
_______________________________________________
Dennis Sexton
Larry,
The Mothers polishing ball works pretty well with their wheel polish. It does not eliminate all hand work.
http://www.amazon.com/MOTHERS-5140-Mothers-05140-PowerBall/dp/B0007RDVD4
If the wheels are really bad you can easily spend up to an hour each. Mine were almost etched with some cement dust but cleaned up nicely --
Good luck.
Dennis
[/quote]
Thanks to everyone for the answers. Since they are probably not coated the polishing company will not charge as much. He said the top price for noncoated wheels is around $100 per wheel. Does it take that much time for a professional to polish them? I am not a chrome and shine guy so I never bought "mags" when I was young all my $$$ went to speed equipment. My wheels are not pitted just dull and neglected and the rallys make me ashamed of my neglect of the nice wheels. What amount of time should I anticipate it requires for me to polish one wheel? [/quote]
--
Dennis S
73 Painted Desert 230
Germantown, TN
Paul Leavitt
When I was a teen I purchased an arbor and some felt wheels and have been polishing ever since. MC cases,wheels,brass bells,,,lots of stuff. To do the alcoas i dismount the buffer from the vice and hold the motor in my hands. You must use the corect polishing compound. My wheels were poor but not bad. Polishing was taking to long so I used 2000 or 1500 wet/dry sand paper and then polished it with the buffer. Do a small area first,,,,to see whats needed. Took about 2 hours of hard work per wheel. I use a 1/3 horse 1750 rpm mtr. Heavy but it works. Wheels from anywhere. Hardware store,,,internet. Polish comes in diffrent grades in stick form. Sometimes I use paste. Whenn the mtr gets too hot to hold with gloves I set it in front of a fan and sand a diffrent wheel. I also whould remove the wheel/tire and set on a bench instead of bending over. Its real handy having a polisher,,,,,,PL
sgl...@gmail.com
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Larry and Cheryl Dilk
WOW! I am surprised at the time and apparent power it takes to get these wheels back to shiny condition now I know why the 2-3 minutes on one spot produced very little shine. I guess the $100 per wheel was not that outrageous.
Thanks for the input.
--
Larry Dilk
Indianapolis, IN
76 Eleganza II
Patterson 455,Turbo City TBI,
Just LOVE It!
MICHAEL FOSTER
You might try driving by a major truck stop. They often have people there who will polish your wheels. Not sure about cost.
Michael
Paul Leavitt
Oh,,,,it won't take them that long because they'll have a 2 or 3 hp buffer. Did they tell you you'll need to dismount the tires/wheels????? You know the only thing between Indiana and Mo is Ill. Bring them on over with or without the GMC. I've got a place to park!!!!,,,,,PL'''''''(1 hr. west of st. L.)
Jiffyjet2
My Alcoa's are less than two years old, but already starting to get dull and even a few pits. The Alcoa dealer in Tacoma recommended Mother's polish which I tried with the "ball" polisher but I didn't really like using it much. I bought some Griot's Garage metal polish and tried it, using their 3 inch orbital buffer. It works really well. It would be better to take the wheels off, since between the lug nuts is by hand and doesn't come up quite as bright. Griot's polish doesn't have a wax in it so they recommend using their "Paint Sealant" after polishing. Some sort of wax is needed or they just go back to what you started out with. One down...6 to go.
--
Jess
'74 Canyonlands
"the Great Pumpkin"
Tacoma, Washington
Nick Chapekis
Larry -
I use SimiChrome on mine. Best stuff I ever used and doesn't require as much elbow grease as Mothers. You can buy it on ebay for $8/tube. I can polish all six wheels about three times on one tube, but I saw your wheels at GMCES, and you'll probably go through a whole tube the first time. Just do one wheel/day and take your time, and before you know it, you'll have shiny wheels and be $592 richer.
--
Nick Chapekis
Ypsilanti, MI
78 Kingsley
Rob Mueller
SimiChrome! If I remember correctly it was made by Happich in Chermany.
Boy you brought back some fond memories! I had a Go Kart 800 when I was a teenager. The engine was a Tecumseh 100cc chain saw
engine. It was modified to the hilt internally and put out 12 HP at 12,000 (or was it 14,000) rpm.
I polished that engine to within an inch of it's life but I never did very well racing despite the power output. At 14 I was 6' 1
1/2" and 220 lbs racing against 90 pounders!
That was my first experience with weight to power ratios!
I hooked up with a buddy that weighed half of what I did and he blew everybody else away when he raced!
Oh yeah, the SimiChrome was the last compound I used on the buffing wheel. Plus I used it in between races on a rag to keep the
engine looking good.
Regards,
Rob M.
-----Original Message-----
From: Nick Chapekis
Larry -
I use SimiChrome on mine. Best stuff I ever used and doesn't require as much elbow grease as Mothers. You can buy it on ebay for
$8/tube. I can polish all six wheels about three times on one tube, but I saw your wheels at GMCES, and you'll probably go through
a whole tube the first time. Just do one wheel/day and take your time, and before you know it, you'll have shiny wheels and be $592
richer.
--
Nick
_______________________________________________
Larry C
Hello
I polished one Alcoa wheel last year, it took me all day to get it looking fair. I gave up.
Last Fall I bought some metal polish from POR15, they claimed it was easy to use and get results.
I tried it on one wheel with a dab of polish and a paper cloth.
I did it by hand, I wanted to guage how difficult it would be to clean the metal.
I dabbed the polish with the paper towel and used a small circular motion to cover the area and kept rubbing until the polish turned dark black. Then it was simply a rub and a dub with a clean paper towel and that spot looked like it came from the factory. A vast difference from what I had used the previous year. the polish was not that expensive as I recall either.. Save some money and try it yourself. Do a wheel a day or week. They will be looking at you like you had bought new ones.
My experience
--
Gatsbys' CRUISER :d 08-18-04
74 GLACIER X, 260/455-APC-4 Bagg'r
Remflex Manifold gaskets
ADD TO THE FUN-GMC'r Campground FINDS />
http://www.gmceast.com/travel
_
Mike Miller
Robert Mueller wrote on Sun, 09 October 2011 15:55
> ...
> Oh yeah, the SimiChrome was the last compound I used on the buffing wheel. Plus I used it in between races on a rag to keep the
> engine looking good.
Yes, a shiny engine does go faster! :twisted:
I came into this thread late, but has anyone tried the
Alcoa Aluminum Care System? It IS designed for Alcoa wheels... (I have heard JimK sells it but can not find all of it on the website.)
I understand that it is a 3 step process and one step is a cleaner that you spray on, wait then wash off. (Seems this is STRONG stuff.) The there is a polish and the last step is a sealer. The instructions I read sounded like it was fairly easy.
--
Mike Miller -- Hillsboro, OR -- on the Black list
(#1)'73 26' exPainted D. -- (#2)`78 23' Birchaven Rear Bath -- (#3)`77 23' Birchaven Side Bath
http://m000035.blogspot.com
Jiffyjet2
I went to the Alcoa dealer in Tacoma to buy the Alcoa 3 step stuff, they didn't have any and didn't carry it. He's the one that told me most people use Mother's. No matter what product you use, when you get to the "polish" step it takes a bunch of elbow grease!
--
Jess
'74 Canyonlands
"the Great Pumpkin"
Tacoma, Washington
Armand Minnie
I bought the Alcoa products from JimK but only the polish and the sealer when my (Eagle) wheels were new about 4 years ago. I have used the polish and sealer a couple of times per year since then and they still look pretty new to me. I think that any fine polish would do but the sealer seems to make a difference.
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Armand Minnie
Marana, AZ
'76 Eleganza II
TZE166V103202
http://www.minniebiz.com/gmcmotorhome
use the forum - it's easy
John R. Lebetski
This stuff works good.
http://asp.americanracing.com/storeimages/eshopsearch/smithbrite-aluminum-polish-standard-application-formula-no-9000904.htm
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John Lebetski
Chicago, IL
77 Eleganza II
Phil Swanson
NO!!!!!!!!!