Finally got done doing my trans am wheels I had bought. They turned out decent, a few spots I need to go back and fix. Let me know what u think. I like these wheels better than after market wheels myself.

 

Sorry Modem users this is going to take a while :-)

Like I said a few touch ups, one spot on one wheel didn't smooth out well so I will have to go back and fix that.

The Tires are Kumho estas 711's which IMO is a good tire for the Price. Especially since this is the first time I have ran these wheels.

For more pictures check out my cardomain site page 2 see sig.

 

Nice!! I need to redo mine on the IROC. I never was happy with the way that they came out.

Kat

 

I wish mine where that easy to polish. Those look really good, nice job.

 

Actually the seemly easy to do shape of those wheels are deceiving because to get the best result you need to do each step at 90 degrees to the last, but it is impossible to do that on these wheels so you have to be extra careful not to deepen scratches in the surface.

But thanks for the complements. I really love how they look on the car, and OMG the handling improvements going to a traction A Temperture A 16" tire from a B traction A Temperture 15" tire. It has been raining here for 2 days and If I hit the brakes real hard it stops and doesn't offer to hydro or skid. If you drive on a sandy/dirty asphault you can hear the tires picking up the sand and throwing it in the fenderwells.

One question keep the 2nd gen birds on the center caps (the crome centers are for the late 70's wheels and came with the stickers on them) or get some thirdgen or ws6 stickers (where can I get them). If I can find them I want to put some red and grey birds on there.

 

looks great man

 

I'd go here:

Center Caps:

 

thanks Ill email them, there side is kinda (made at home in netscape composer look) but I'll see if they will sell just the sticker. Someone told me about somewhere local that may have them.

 

That looks great I am hopfully getting another set that I will be redoing. did you have to strip the factory clear off and how hard was it to polish.

 

they look good, did u ever think about having them powdercoated chrome .they look good though.

 

Yea I thought about crome powdercoat but it is just about as shiny as good polishd aluminum. It cost me 70 to polish them, it would of cost me 150 a wheel to have them powdercoated, at least thats what the only place that would do it locally wanted. And shipping them somewhere just seemed to expensive.

The close up is of the one that turned out the worse, it was the first and I didn't have a compressor that would spin the digrinder up to its full speed. I went over to a friends house that has a 300 gal compressor and did the other 3, but didn't have time to redo the first, I will re do it this summer.

 

How hard was it to get the clear coat off and did you re-clear them.

 

WOW those wheels look killer, nice polish and paint job!!

 

I used Aircraft Stripper on the wheels to get the clear coat. It got 99% of it off, there were a few spots I had to sand to get the clear coat off. You can buy Aircraft Stripper at autozone or most paint stores.

I used the eastwood companies wheel smoothing kit to polish it.

I painted it with dupli color wheel paint, I was going to get some mixed but found the color I wanted to use in the dupli color, and it was high temp wheel paint.

No I didn't re clear coat the polished part, it tends to dull it some, its better to just wax the wheels when you wash the car. Now if you go several mo between washes you may want to clear coat them, but you want good clear coat if you do.

I did them w/o tires on the rims and let them sit a few weeks before mounting to let the paint dry.

Now I want to lower the car, with the 15's the fender space didn't look bad but with the 16's it bugs me, I thinking an inch drop on the rear and 1-1.5 on the front but I want to keep the car level.