Alloy wheel refurb question

[livinginasia]

Hi everyone, another one of my strange questions I am afraid.

We have an elderly 4x4 with 20 inch alloys that really have seen better days, and one is now leaking air due to corrosion on the alloy, so they need a refurb. Hopefully get them diamond cut if there is enough metal, if not stripped and painted.

Spoken to two places - one we have to drop the car off and leave it for three days (no problem, we have other cars) and they are booked up for two months, so I assume they are good, which bodes well.

The other option is a mobile place who will come to our house, and say they can do them in an afternoon.

Does anyone have any experience in how long it takes to refurb 4 20 inch wheels? To take them off the car, remove tyres, strip wheels, either diamond cut or paint and then lacquer and dry, put all the tyres back and refit to the car seems like a bigger job than one afternoon.

Or am I making this too complicated?

Price is the same and certainly at home is more convenient, but it seems too quick. Any thoughts please ? Thanks as always !

[ziggy328]

IMO they need to be baked and cooled to be done properly. Therefore, not in an afternoon on your driveway.

[steveo3002]

van will be a cosmetic tidy up like a car sales year would use

sounds like you want them stripping to deal with the corrosion properly

[normalbloke]

Don’t use the mobile place. You ideally want the tyres fully removed, then stripped and the whole wheel including the inner well and beads recoated. The ‘playing card’ refurb gang as usually less than ideal. Also avoid diamond cut if you’re looking for any sensible durability. Where are you located? Others may have decent suggestions based on that.

[R4EVS]

livinginasia said:

The other option is a mobile place who will come to our house, and say they can do them in an afternoon.

Does anyone have any experience in how long it takes to refurb 4 20 inch wheels? To take them off the car, remove tyres, strip wheels, either diamond cut or paint and then lacquer and dry, put all the tyres back and refit to the car seems like a bigger job than one afternoon.

I think you know yourself that the "afternoon" job will not be a dip and strip, paint, cut and lacquer then baked to dry job. It'll be a cosmetic blow-over of the front faces and the tyres won't even be removed, just masked around.

A mobile operation would be unable to carry all the equipment necessary to do a proper job unless it was an articulated lorry.

[Unreal]

livinginasia said:

Hi everyone, another one of my strange questions I am afraid.

We have an elderly 4x4 with 20 inch alloys that really have seen better days, and one is now leaking air due to corrosion on the alloy, so they need a refurb. Hopefully get them diamond cut if there is enough metal, if not stripped and painted.

Spoken to two places - one we have to drop the car off and leave it for three days (no problem, we have other cars) and they are booked up for two months, so I assume they are good, which bodes well.

The other option is a mobile place who will come to our house, and say they can do them in an afternoon.

Does anyone have any experience in how long it takes to refurb 4 20 inch wheels? To take them off the car, remove tyres, strip wheels, either diamond cut or paint and then lacquer and dry, put all the tyres back and refit to the car seems like a bigger job than one afternoon.

Or am I making this too complicated?

Price is the same and certainly at home is more convenient, but it seems too quick. Any thoughts please ? Thanks as always !

I'd like to see the sand blasting and spraying equipment and oven that the mobile operator uses.

In my experience the mobile job will not be anywhere near the level of one done in a proper unit. Fine if it's half the price but at the same price, no way.

It's usually a few days to get wheels refurbed, on or off the car, unless you pay extra.

[livinginasia]

Awesome thank you so much for the kind replies.

This does confirm what I was thinking - it just didn’t seem
Possible, the mobile place just seemed far too quick to do it properly.

If anyone has any suggestion in the West Sussex area that would be fabulous. Looking at Wheel Works in Crawley as the place to go to.

Thanks again

[Unreal]

livinginasia said:

Awesome thank you so much for the kind replies.

This does confirm what I was thinking - it just didn t seem
Possible, the mobile place just seemed far too quick to do it properly.

If anyone has any suggestion in the West Sussex area that would be fabulous. Looking at Wheel Works in Crawley as the place to go to.

Thanks again

Used Wheel Works numerous times. Completely reputable.

[livinginasia]

Unreal said:

Used Wheel Works numerous times. Completely reputable.

Thank you ! Decision made, will book in with them.

PistonHeads saves the day again !

[Mark V GTD]

Please post up some 'before and after' pics - good luck!

[livinginasia]

These are the “before” pics as they are now - will upload some more once they are all looking shiny and new. Thanks again !!

[Techno9000]

+1 for Wheel Works. Have used them twice with good, long lasting results each time.

[livinginasia]

Techno9000 said:

+1 for Wheel Works. Have used them twice with good, long lasting results each time.

Awesome thanks so much !

[AddyT.]

Have used Revive, once to sort out my wifes kerbed wheels on our driveway and did a super job. Took my last car to their local workshop for 21” wheel repairs. One was pretty badly chewed up from hitting a concrete kerb on a B road at speed. They did three wheels and I dropped it off on a Wednesday lunchtime and collected it on a Friday morning. They did a fantastic job. Another workshop I had showed the car to first weren’t sure if there was enough purchase left on the badly damaged wheel as they advised the last owner had already had that wheel done before and explained what they were seeing. Hence Revive’s repair was some sort of witchcraft as it looked like it was brand new!

[Panamax]

Just remember that next time a wheel gets kerbed it will be knackered again whether you go the driveway route or the professional route. That's why I use the driveway people.

If a wheel is so knackered it's leaking air there are questions to be asked. Is the bead not sealing or has your wheel gone porous? That's the question.

Check out the price of used wheels on Ebay. Loads on there. (And totally cheap-bodge-tastic, nobody will notice if the wheels on the driver side are different from the wheels on the passenger side... They just need to be dimensionally identical.)

[livinginasia]

AddyT. said:

Have used Revive, once to sort out my wifes kerbed wheels on our driveway and did a super job. Took my last car to their local workshop for 21 wheel repairs. One was pretty badly chewed up from hitting a concrete kerb on a B road at speed. They did three wheels and I dropped it off on a Wednesday lunchtime and collected it on a Friday morning. They did a fantastic job. Another workshop I had showed the car to first weren t sure if there was enough purchase left on the badly damaged wheel as they advised the last owner had already had that wheel done before and explained what they were seeing. Hence Revive s repair was some sort of witchcraft as it looked like it was brand new!

Thank you - I really appreciate the recommendation, not too far from me as well as just outside Guildford by the look of it

[Mark V GTD]

Presume your going for all one colour on these - a lot of diamond cut alloys have the recessed part painted black but on yours its a lighter grey so not so much of a contrast and not having the lacquered faces will make them more durable.