Refurbishing Wheels

[Jackallensmith]

I'm looking for the name of a person/company to refurbished my '58 356a wheels (paint) back to their original state/color. I live in CT, but will ship them. Any recommendations?

[Sebastian Gaeta]

Any GOOD body shop in your area can do it since you are painting them. Wurth sells the paint in the correct color and can be bought at Stoddard.

And good for you for painting them, too many 356's out there with chrome wheels IMHO.

[Adam Wright]

I caution against sending them to just anybody. All of these wheels are pushing 50 years old, so even the pretty ones need a good straightening. About 90% of the wheels we sell go directly to Bolton Perfect Motion Wheels in Gardena, CA, their phone number is 310 819 6752, ask for Carol or Javier.
And we sell a lot of wheels.

[Sebastian Gaeta]

Adam, does Bolton also paint wheels? I thought they just did the chrome finish. I do know that they will also straighten them if needed.

[Adam Wright]

Adam, does Bolton also paint wheels? I thought they just did the chrome finish. I do know that they will also straighten them if needed.

They can paint, powder coat, or chrome. Normally if someone wants very nice chrome I send them to PICO, more expensive but with chrome, good isn't cheap. But for painting and powdercoating Bolton is the place! Send hundreds of wheels there and never heard a bad thing said later.

[Sebastian Gaeta]

Great to know that, I thought they only did chrome.

[Dan Epperly]

What do they charge per wheel to straighten and paint?

[Mike Wilson]

Are we talking silver or body color? I'd touch base with Perfect Wheels (formerly Bolton's) to verify.

Mike

[Jim Liberty]

If you are doing a Pre - A, have the paint shop prep and paint them body color. Just had Shane East do my car, I could not be more pleased. .................Jim.

[John Schiavone]

++++ on Perfect Custom Wheels. I've had several done -- all perfect!! Gray paint they use in center is not right (too light) but easily corrected. Adam, any luck finding a 3/66 for me? Thanks

[Steve Proctor]

Hmm, some thoughts on wheels.

1) Unless much (MUCH) care is taken, powder paint does not come out well. Tried twice. On the first try, sand was not cleared from the crevices between the center and painted over. On the second, the powder itself bridged the crevice in several places and was uneven. Neither was anywhere as nice as a good application of paint.

2) The factory allowable axial and radial runout spec for the wheels is 1.5mm (page 81 of the Porsche SPEC's (sic) book). Before I would send wheels to be straightened, I would check against this spec. A friend and I both had wobblers after de-rimming / re-rimming and chroming at a very well-known shop. He sent the offending wheel back twice and twice it came back with a wobble. When we visited the shop to investigate, we fully expected a precision truing rig with a dial indicator. What we found was a relatively primitive rig with a nail sticking out to gauge only the axial runout.

3) If within spec, why would any competent local shop not be able to paint the wheels with a proper fine grain silver?