Hi All,
I have long had a set of the CLK Light Alloy forged wheels on my 300TD. After many years of sun baking, and general wear and tear, the original clear had become cracked (spider webbing) and faded in several places, was time to refinish them.

Stripping was relatively easy, I tried 2 commonly available paint strippers Stypeeze and Rust-O-Lium Aircraft stripper, both in thick gel form for vertical surfaces. Both strippers worked well, with a slight advantage to the Aircraft stripper, but very slight. Both strippers took 2 coats to remove 97% of the finish, each requiring a third stripper application on the remaining spots.

Polishing was not needed. Amazing difference once the stripper was removed, gleaming polished wheels staring back at me. I did use some Never Dull cotton wadding to go around the highly polished lip and center mostly to remove water spots and slight old clear coat residue, but spent less than 5 min per wheel with the Never Dull. Used a solvent based afterwash to remove all residue, you could use brake cleaner or acetone instead.

After masking the tires, this was a quick weekend project, I chose to shoot them with SprayMax 2K Glamour High Gloss clear coat 3680061. 2x light/medium coats per wheel and let dry/fully cure for 18hrs. This clear comes in a handy 2 chamber spray can. when you are ready to spray, you use the provided plunger to release the catalyst from the one chamber into the other. You have an approximate working time of 48 hrs before the unused contents in the can begin to solidify. The included spray tip is quite good, I had no problem doing all four wheels with 2 coats each and no runs with 2 spray cans. Coverage wise as noted I used 2 cans, but had done 3 wheels 2 coats with just the first can alone. The second can was used for the 4th wheel and then other items I had prepped for the same coating to not let the second can go to waste. Cost, aprox #22 per can.

Before and after shown below. Please note that the before shown here was actually the best before conditioned one of the bunch. The change was drastic for the others but alas, no pictures of those.

Hope this helps

Attached Thumbnails

   

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Stable Mates:
1987 300TD 310K mi (Hans)
2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee OM642 165k mi (Benzrokee)

Looks great! I just found a set of really good ones in the junkyard (with great tires no less!) and mounted them- taking off the 15 hole ones I had on. When it's time to refinish them I'll reread what you've done and copy it!

Thank you
I really like the look of these wheels on the w124, and have been complimented many times on just that, on how right they look, even before refinishing. The weight differential between them and the 15 hole wheels is impressive, I cant recall the specs, (I believe GSXR has that on his site) but if memory serves it felt like they weighed less than half of the old wheels. Plus the increase to 16" and tire size helps significantly in performance without much sacrifice to ride comfort.

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Stable Mates:
1987 300TD 310K mi (Hans)
2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee OM642 165k mi (Benzrokee)

@87tdwagen Great job on the refinishing of the wheels. I've been wanting to do that on my '94 Bronco but have been concerned that the stripper would damage the tires and create a safety issue. Was that an issue for you or were you able to keep the tires clean?

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Deuce
'02 CLK430 (Nightwing) 54K
'11 ML350 109K
'21 VW Atlas (Wife's Rocket)
'94 Bronco XLT (Son 1)
'06 Honda Odyssey 180K (Sold)
'02 E320 151K (Sold)
'96 E300D (RIP Riggo - 12/16/2010) 198K
'03 Honda Odyssey 34K (Sold)
'95 E300D 145K (Sold)
'01 Mazda Tribute 19K (Sold)

Thanks deuce.

No concerns, I had masked off the tire from the rim for both the stripping and clear coat. The strippers did not attack the rubber and probably wont as most of the directions advise the use of rubber gloves when using the product, so safe to assume that rubber is not a material they attack. Best to read the instructions and warnings on the product label to be sure.

Good luck on your Bronco wheels, should be a big improvement in finish when done.

__________________
Stable Mates:
1987 300TD 310K mi (Hans)
2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee OM642 165k mi (Benzrokee)