HELP! Aluminum Wheel Cleaning Gone Wrong

[skibob1027]

Hi everyone - I've been a longtime reader and finally got myself into a pickle and can't find another thread that addresses the issue. I recently took possession of a 1986 Chevy C10 Silverado that is near-and-dear to my heart. It was originally my grandpa's when I was a kid and I've been working to bring it back to it's original glory after a few years of disuse.

The previous owner put a set of Boss 338 wheels with the gunmetal center (link). They have some sort of painted or treated aluminum finish in the center with an uncoated, polished aluminum lip. They look decent but will eventually get replaced with chrome wheels for purposes of my sanity when I have the cash.

Anyhow, the first time I went to clean the wheels I used Mother's Foaming Wheel and Tire Cleaner (link) and the result was predictable. Fifteen years ago I had a truck with polished aluminum wheels and this same junk made them cloudy and required endless polishing to restore them.

Unfortunately, the gunmetal finish is the worst effected this time. The polished lips are back to full glory, but I cannot get the streaks out of the gunmetal area. I have tried Nevr-Dull, Mothers Mag and Aluminum Polish, and rubbing compound to no avail. Pictures are below for your edification.

Any guidance on how to remove these streaks from the gunmetal surface of the wheels?

Image Gallery

 

[ZiggyPopp]

When you polished using the mothers polish did your rag tun black? Just want to make sure they are not coated. If they are not clear coated as you say, keep at it maybe use a small brush since the spokes look textured ? Elbow grease is the key. You can also use polish like Meguiars 105/205 too. If you use them keep spritzing with water. Lake country makes a wool polishing ball that you can use with a speed drill. That might save you some time. I would not try to use one of the foam balls to get that out. If all else fails, you can use wet sanding paper but of course you will need to be prepared to polish them out completely after that.




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[Mantilgh]

I don't think that they can be corrected.

The gun metal area looks like a thin single stage paint or some thin coating.

It probably wouldn't be to bad to lightly sand the painted areas, tape off the polished, and repaint them if you are handy.

 

[GSKR]

Hi everyone - I've been a longtime reader and finally got myself into a pickle and can't find another thread that addresses the issue. I recently took possession of a 1986 Chevy C10 Silverado that is near-and-dear to my heart. It was originally my grandpa's when I was a kid and I've been working to bring it back to it's original glory after a few years of disuse.

The previous owner put a set of Boss 338 wheels with the gunmetal center (link). They have some sort of painted or treated aluminum finish in the center with an uncoated, polished aluminum lip. They look decent but will eventually get replaced with chrome wheels for purposes of my sanity when I have the cash.

Anyhow, the first time I went to clean the wheels I used Mother's Foaming Wheel and Tire Cleaner (link) and the result was predictable. Fifteen years ago I had a truck with polished aluminum wheels and this same junk made them cloudy and required endless polishing to restore them.

Unfortunately, the gunmetal finish is the worst effected this time. The polished lips are back to full glory, but I cannot get the streaks out of the gunmetal area. I have tried Nevr-Dull, Mothers Mag and Aluminum Polish, and rubbing compound to no avail. Pictures are below for your edification.

Any guidance on how to remove these streaks from the gunmetal surface of the wheels?

Image Gallery

That may be a challenge try some compound with no grit.Good luck.

 

[Crispy]

Wet sand with 3000 grit a small section and then polish with compound and pad that can remove the sanding scratches.

Inspect your results and go from there.

They may be powder coated and the only way I know to test is use a fine polish and see if it goes black or white.

Black is powder coat, White is paint.

Powder coated needs fine polishing only and lots of it (no sanding- it will go darker).

 

[forrest@mothers]

I'd hardly consider our wheel cleaner "junk", but I would suggest you contact Tech Support at 714-891-3364 between 9 and 5 west coast time, or email <[email protected]>.

Using the proper wheel cleaner is always a good idea. Our Polished Aluminum Wheel Cleaner would be a good choice, as it would have been 15 years ago. Foaming Wheel & Tire is for factory coated or painted rims.

Contact Jimmy D and give him a chance to help you.

 

[jimd@mothers]

I will, of course, agree with Forrest, and we are both very sorry for your trouble.

While this formula has only been around for about 6 or 7 years, you might have used another wheel cleaner for the wrong surface that cause that incident so many years ago.

Our Wheel & Tire Cleaner is formulated for late model OEM wheels with a durable glossy finish. Aftermarket finishes are often more vulnerable to a strong cleaner, sometimes of lesser quality, and generally exotic (i.e., again, various reasons that they are more vulnerable to a strong cleaner). In this case it's likely the matte or satin finish allowed the cleaner to penetrate into the pores -- this can also happen if the wheels are hot, or if the finish is oxidized or otherwise aged. I might have some ideas to try to fix these.

When addressing any aspect of finish care, it is important to select the proper product for the finish, and in this case our Polished Aluminum Wheel Cleaner would have been a better choice for the bare lips on these wheels, as well as the center finish. Wheel & Tire Cleaner specifically says not for aftermarket wheels and to avoid polished aluminum -- and to check with the wheel manufacturer.

Keep in mind that most aftermarket wheel manufacturers recommend using only car wash, and I'm not going to convince anyone otherwise, even if it costs us a sale.

So basically you missed three important "don'ts."

But just the same, I look forward to hearing from you so that I may hopefully assist.

 

[swanicyouth]

I'm curious why you would go to this line of products when previously having a bad experience with them?

Anyway, I'm not sure if that can be fixed without having the finish re-done. But to me - it's looks like 1 of 2 things happened here:

1. The wheels were sprayed with cleaner when they were hot.

2. The cleaner was allowed to dry on the wheels (looks like even sprayed on the wheels dry?).

Not to come off as a snot, but just an FYI - always clean 1 wheel at a time start to finish... Then inspect....Especially if you are using a new product or cleaning "new" wheels. That way, say some damage did occur - it would just be to 1 wheel.

I'm sure there is nothing "magic" about this wheel cleaner. It's either pH acidic or basic (like most/all?) OTC wheel cleaners designed for "factory" painted wheels. Likely, the same thing would have happened with any similar product from Megs, etc...

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Hi everyone - I've been a longtime reader and finally got myself into a pickle and can't find another thread that addresses the issue.

Welcome to AutogeekOnline! :welcome:

Love seeing people transition from lurkers to active members!

I recently took possession of a 1986 Chevy C10 Silverado

Cool truck.

I own a 1987 Silverado 4x4

The previous owner put a set of Boss 338 wheels with the gunmetal center (link).

They have some sort of

1. painted or treated aluminum finish in the center
2. with an uncoated, polished aluminum lip.

That's a multi-surface wheel.


I think I cover this in my how-to book, The Complete Guide to a Show Car Shine. Just to comment, my how-to books are just like my "replies" here on the forum, they tend to be in-depth, detailed and complete.


Here's the book, that's a cheesy picture of me on the cover...

On page 23

Under the heading,

Combination of coated and uncoated

The information shared is when it comes to working on multi-surface wheels - a safe choice is to stick with a wheel cleaner specicially formulated for uncoated polished aluminum

Anyhow, the first time I went to clean the wheels I used Mother's Foaming Wheel and Tire Cleaner (link) and the result was predictable.

Fifteen years ago I had a truck with polished aluminum wheels and this same junk made them cloudy and required endless polishing to restore them.

So I clicked on the link you included in your comments above and here's a screenshot of the page and product it took me to... I drew a box around the important part of the directions Mothers included on the page and I'm confident it's also on the bottle. (I'll check)

Because the above picture is 924 pixels wide, our forum software automatically resizes the image to 800 pixels wide and this can make the image of text small and hard to read. So below I've cut out the picture of the bottle so there's only the text...

Anyhow, the first time I went to clean the wheels I used Mother's Foaming Wheel and Tire Cleaner (link) and the result was predictable.

Fifteen years ago I had a truck with polished aluminum wheels and this same junk made them cloudy and required endless polishing to restore them.

I don't think it's fair to come onto the Autogeek forum, a resources for the products sold on Autogeek.com, of which one brand is Mothers and then call one of their products junk when it's very apparent the product is NOT for the wheels on your truck and Mothers, to their credit), warns the masses that this product is for OEM wheels or Original Manufacturer Wheels, NOT custom aftermarket wheels.

Unfortunately, the gunmetal finish is the worst effected this time. The polished lips are back to full glory, but I cannot get the streaks out of the gunmetal area. I have tried Nevr-Dull, Mothers Mag and Aluminum Polish, and rubbing compound to no avail.

Pictures are below for your edification.

Any guidance on how to remove these streaks from the gunmetal surface of the wheels?

After listing the things you've already tried I'm dismayed to say I don't have any other product recommendation for you to try to remove the stains.

The stains are either topical, that is on the surface or sub-surface, that is below the surface as in they have penetrated INTO the paint and my guess is both.

If the stains have penetrated INTO the gunmetal paint then the ONLY way to remove them is to abrade the surface and remove enough paint to remove the portion of paint that is stained and not only will this be difficulty to do by hand or some sort of machine but it will likely mean removing enough material to expose the underlying coating or the substrate which will probably be aluminum. Then you'll definitely have to re-finish the wheels.


From the looks of the stains in the gunmetal finish (gunmetal colored paint), the surface looks textured and if this is accurate then abrading the surface will make it smooth thus changing the appearance of the areas you abrade as compared to any areas you don't abrade.

Sorry to say but this is an example us using the wrong product for the job and the mistake is not because Mothers makes junk products, the mistake was not researching the wheels you have and the specific types of surfaces that are on the wheel and then researching wheel cleaners and matching the right wheel cleaner to the surfaces used for this brand and model of wheel.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I'd hardly consider our wheel cleaner "junk", but I would suggest you contact Tech Support at 714-891-3364 between 9 and 5 west coast time, or email <[email protected]>.

Using the proper wheel cleaner is always a good idea. Our Polished Aluminum Wheel Cleaner would be a good choice, as it would have been 15 years ago. Foaming Wheel & Tire is for factory coated or painted rims.

Contact Jimmy D and give him a chance to help you.

Thanks for chiming in Forrest....


For those of you that don't know, Forrest is one of the nicest guys in our industry. He is a consummate professional. This means he's a man of his word and when he says he'll do something he will do it.

I've known Forrest since we first met online in 2002 on the Autopia.org discussion forum and thin in person when I did a little shindig to promote NXT Tech Wax back when it was still Lab Sample D.


He has shown himself to consistently be a professional, a gentleman and a friend to everyone in both the car hobby and the car detailing industry.


It's great to have known you all these years and to call you a friend...


:dblthumb2:

 

[forrest@mothers]

Thanks for the kind words, Mike. Jimmy D is waiting to hear from the poster. We'll find a way to help fix the problem, even if it's due to user error.

Meanwhile, back the Power Tour. Next stop, Indy.