Topic: Paint stripping wheel with tire?

[stereosilence]

Somebody in the past painted my wheels and spokes black. I want to return to metal (and possibly powder coat in the future). Can I just go at them with aircraft stripper without taking them off the bike?

[Magilla]

You can leave them on as long as your careful. Your best bet for removing the paint would be to use walnut blasting.  It will remove paint but not hurt your tires. You can buy/rent a sand blaster and use fine walnut. It's pretty simple.  What is your plan for the wheels once the paint is removed?  It will rust pretty quickly if you don't do something.

[ekpent]

As with most products it best to test in a very small inconspicuous area first to see what kind of a reaction there is between materials.Since paint does not bond well,especially cheap rattlecan, on chrome maybe less caustic materials may get it off like wiping some lacquer thinner or something. Interesting to see if they roughed up the chrome before painting.

[luap]

If your going to powdercoat them leave them how they are, The powdercoat company will blast them for you. least the company I go to does 35.00 a wheel

[stereosilence]

So, the wheels are originally chromed? My plan is to possibly get them powdercoated when I do the frame (which is probably a long time in the future). I was thinking it might be possible to strip the paint and shine them up decently, but it sounds like that isn't possible.

[Stev-o]

He probably painted them because they were rusty

[ncstatecamp]

Why not remove the tire? You'll have to to get them powdercoated....

[Toxic]

I don't think you are likely to find pristine chrome under that paint.  Why not touch up the paint if it needs it and when you are ready to tackle the job take the wheel off and send it to your powder coater. As mentioned above they usually sandblast it first.

I think you are likely to be creating a mess for yourself.

[wvshooter]

I want to return to metal (and possibly powder coat in the future).

As another said, that paint is on there to cover some pretty rough chrome so the chances of making it look decent are just about zero. I'm in the same boat with my bike except I just have rusty chrome wheels and ugly spokes.

I'm in the process of doing mine now. I have a new set of front and rear spokes from www.cb750supply.com for $60.  They are cadium coated according to the web site and  look very nice. I'm going to paint the chrome wheels with Hammerite brand aerosol paint. A very durable/hard coating available at www.tcpglobal.com