paint VS powdercoat for alloy wheels

[Sir Nodrick]

Hi guys,

Upto now, i've always sprayed wheels with paint, but a lot of you get your wheels powder coated... I've heard a very mixed bag of opinions between both the spraying option or the powder coating option.....

therefore, a poll..... which would you have done and why?? which is most susceptible to stone chips, which flakes off after stone chips, which deteriates faster, do either of them dull after time and finally, do strong wheel cleaners (TFR, wonder wheels, etc.) damage them??

cheers guys.:thumbs:

[Rich_D]

Interested in this too as I'm about to refurb my wheels...

[spm_steve]

i've just had my Advan's rims re-furb'd by spraying/baking using a House of Kolour candy finish.

i would rather have powdercoated for durability but due to the rim design was advised not to - i've a set of R32's for winter use though and the finish on the wheels is fantastic and with 3layers of laquer they should be fairly stone chip resistant.

i won't be using any wheel cleaner though, soap and water.

[Mattp87]

from my experience with bike wheels i always had the wheels powdercoated or atleast sprayed and baked as this meant it would be alot harder to chip the wheels and if it does chip it won't flake off afterwards. spraying is good pricewise but powdercoating is cheaper than you think, could probably have a set of 4 wheels powdercoated for about £100 at a guess

[Sir Nodrick]

well, i've been quoted the same to powdercoat as spraying so its whichever is best now...

[D1 RWD]

id get em painted, i had my rotas painted over a year ago and the only part i havt to touch up every now and agin is the red lip, but its only because small chips show up on the red.

i was told powder coating alloys can make them brittle, because of the high temperature that they have to be baked at, but i could be wrong !!

[Mr G]

Where's George when you need him....

[George]

i was told powder coating alloys can make them brittle, because of the high temperature that they have to be baked at, but i could be wrong !!

That's an urban myth I'm afraid. It came from a problem with Toyota and Lexus alloys. The cast that they used was so poor quality and porous that the chemical dipping to strip the old paint off would attack the structure of the metal (Some of the chemicals have hydrochloric acid in them). A couple of people had the hub snap out of the wheel under braking and now they don't refurbish any of their wheels under warranty. They just supply new ones.

It wasn't heat or anything to do with the powder coating process that buggered the wheels, just the acid eating the poor quality cast from the inside out!

As far as coating choice goes, it depends on the colour you want. You can get far brighter silvers and metalic colours with wet paint than you can with powder coat, but the powder coat will last much longer on a wheel and won't chip as easily. Both of them will get destroyed by a kerb though.

What I tend to do for brighter colours is use a powder coat base coat, a wet paint for the colour, then a powder coat lacquer over the top of the whole lot.

Hope that helps:)

[Sir Nodrick]

, it depends on the colour you want. You can get far brighter silvers and metalic colours with wet paint than you can with powder coat, but the powder coat will last much longer on a wheel and won't chip as easily. Both of them will get destroyed by a kerb though.

Hope that helps:)

i want black. i haven't fully decided whether i want satin or matt, i sprayed them last time with satin so probably the same this time....

[Jord]

I've always painted.

If you've ever chipped powder coated wheels you'll know why. You don't just lose a 1" chunk, it comes off in huge bits.

[Midgers]

That's an urban myth I'm afraid....

George - I know you know what you're doing and you're in the business as it were - but I had a wheel re- powder coated a few years back and 6 months down the line 8 or 9 of the 10 spokes on the R33GTR wheel were cracked.
Given that you know what you're doing and how to do it properly I can understand how you see it, but if a wheel was heated too much, or some part of the treatement done incorrectly is it not possible that powder coating was to blame?

Or did I just manage to buy a shonky wheel?

:)


I've always painted.

If you've ever chipped powder coated wheels you'll know why. You don't just lose a 1" chunk, it comes off in huge bits.

Tru dat. :nod:

[andy535is]

hi all not trying to step on any ones toes, but certain alloys will be weakenend when subject to high oven temps , i have had this on my full sus mtb when i had the rear swingarm ,and seatstay powder coated ,and they bent like a bananna after 1 drop off, and my mate had his fireblade wheels powder coated before a trip to le mans and had a flat rear tyre the next morning after arriving :eek: could have been well nasty on the way down, alloys have to be heat treated with care :thumbs:

[George]

For an alloy wheel, the metal will not be heated above 220C which will only anneal the metal if it is left in for in excess of 5 hours, Alloy wheels wil only see this temperature for 15mins before a lower temperature is used for a further 15mins on final cure. Annealing the alloy will only make it tougher at the expense of a little yeild strength.

Your bike parts will have been a mixture of extrusions, cold formed tubes, and small forged brackets, and will not have been exposed to temperatures beyond 180C and only for a maximum of 30 mins which won't really do a lot to alloys of aluminium.

Either a very high temperature has been used, the parts have been quenched with water after heating, or some other complete tits has been made of it.

BMW, Audi, BBS, etc. use powder coat as a base on their wheels before applying wet paints to get the desired colour. They wouldn't do this if it destroyed their wheels (I'm sure they have looked into it):).

[George]

I've always painted.

If you've ever chipped powder coated wheels you'll know why. You don't just lose a 1" chunk, it comes off in huge bits.

That shouldn't happen. The only way it can happen is either an undercure (makes the coating brittle) or incompatable coatings have been used i.e. a base colour with a wax content acting as a release agent for the lacquer.

All the successive coats of powder should only get a partial cure prior to the next coat going on so that the whole lot knit together as one coat and cannot be chipped from one another or the substrate they are on.

Another possible cause would be the alloy having been left for too long between blasting and coating and no phosphating solution being used so that oxides build up on the surface and prevent proper adhesion to the substrate.:)

[Jord]

OK, you win on knowledge haha :D

Just from experience, my mate chipped his wheel when mounting tyres and half the powdercoat flaked and lifted off like brittle chocolate.

[Johnny]

I powder coated ..... and the finish is awesom .... until you drop a wheel or kerb them, and it isnt easy to touch it back up with the powder coating now being chipped and flaking.

I would paint the next time around, deffo easier to repair after a misshap