To paint or powder coat

[weymouth399]

I have some ugly spare wheels for my ice racer. I was wondering to just painting them or powder coat them? A buddy has p/c business but he paints his wheels with allgrip
boat paint. He also repairs boats.
So I was looking for imput on what others may have done or seen done.

TIA Bob W

[lifeishp]

i painted my rims and it looks great but doesn't last long. i got about three hours out of them before they started to chip and i live in the desert. my friend who did it first got one ride but i think i helped ruin his rims cause i kept roosting him. definently powder them, thats what i want to do i just don't know anybody with a gun. if you paint them the front will probably last a lot longer, mine still looks almost like it did when i first painted it and that was last summer but the back takes hell from rocks and gravel. i clear coated the s**t out of them and that helped a little but not much so if you want great looks and good durability powder coat them for sure !!! then ya know if you could spare your gun for a few days . . .  so hope this helps. have a great day

[alward25]

You can buy a cheap gun hat does a really nice job for less than $100 and powder is very cheap.  Do it yourself!!!!!  Then you can charge your buddies to powdercoat stuff.  The powder is non toxic,  i used my kitchen oven and turned the fan on and is was barely noticable.

[lifeishp]

so the cheap guns still do good jobs ? i've been leary about buying a cheap one cause i figured it would do a crappy job and i don't have the money for a high dollar one

[alward25]

Experimemt on some random stuff.  Know that textured and translucent finishes nake a little different,  just play with it.  I have made some good extra money doing it.  Some are more durable than others too.

[weymouth399]

Thanks for replys (please keep them coming) I think I will try paint first. These wheels will never see dirt and are ice only. So they shouldn't get roosted by sand & dirt, but will by ice & water. Ice tires (canadian) have a much stiffers sidewall and should have less tire flex, so they shoudn't wear the paint. Time will tell.

Bob W

[tribaltalon]

i would think ice would be alot more corrosive/sharper then dirt, but it cant hurt to try.