This blog post details the second part of our refurbishment process. Part 1 can be found here.
The wheels are now ready for the painting process.
The first thing we do is place a masking disc on the hub. This is to ensure no paint or lacquer gets between the wheel and the car when tightening bolts later on.
Before paint can be applied we must first degas the wheel to remove any moisture and air. This is achieved by heating the wheel in our oven at 200°C for 25 minutes.
The powder primer or powder base coat is now applied. For the Mini wheels in the images we are using a Gunmetal finish. The above left picture is part finished, with the fully painted wheel on the right. The painting process takes place in our water wash booth within the paint room. Here surplus powder and paint as well as fumes are drawn into the water curtain extraction system. The wheels now go back into the oven for a further 10 minutes at 180°C to cure the powder.
Once the wheels have cooled down to around 70°C we apply the acrylic lacquer powder which, as you can see above, goes on white. The wheels are now hung back in the oven to fully cure the base coat and lacquer for a further 25 minutes at 180°C.
Here you can see one of the finished wheels in the paint room cooling down and back on the car, job done!
Although stripping times vary on average the whole process, from taking the wheels off the car to putting them back on again, takes approximately 18 hours for a set of four wheels.
Do feel free to ask us any questions about the process or by all means come along and see us.
Steve – ACC Wheels
To chat about having your wheels refurbished, give us a call on 01428 751899.