ok check this out, I have a 92 SE with the stock rims. the clear coat on the rims is all muffed up on it and i was thinking about having them bead blasted. well, i sorta came up with this because the rims will be off the car, and tires will probably be broken down. If i have them bead blasted they will be kinda like alloys. But what if i had them painted black to match my black car??? i've already got 50 series tires running so i thought that with black stock SE rims might look sweet. I just came up with this about 10 minutes ago. what do you all think?

Not black. A dark gunmetal metallic gray would be much nicer. Make absolutely sure they are bead blasted and not sandblasted. Sand will put tiny pits all over the wheels.

I was gonna do this, but i was going to get paint stripper/clearcoat stripper and get all the old stuff off...worked wonders on my old car's wheels(Firebird).

For your wheels that have a nice finish, it's not necessary to strip the old paint off. Just clean them good and sand them w/ 400 grit wet/dry sandpaper. Works well, trust me. I've painted alot of rims for people in the past.

Hey jeff im goign to re paint my rims soon. can you give me some tips's thans(liek what kind of paint)

Yeah. But I have a compressor and two paint guns. One is a regular and one is a small touch up gun. I used regular automotive paints. The very last set I did was a factory looking silver metallic. Instead of a base and color it was a one step. I worked out pretty well and the guy had the tires mounted w/o any of the paint coming off on the rim portion. If you don't have access to a paint gun and compressor, it gets hard to put down a quality looking paint job.

Didn't think I have seen them in a silver like that. Why didn't you bondo the center caps when you painted them? I have a friend here who has those same rims in chrome w/ black center caps - hafta ask him where they came from.

Something I have done a few times that's cheap and easy (though it only looks good on certain wheels) is to have the whole wheel bead blasted and then polish the lip. Looks really good.

Here's an example:
<img src="http://www.speedtoys.com/~wedge/images/wheel2_c.jpg">

Later,

Jacob

No it wasn't the stang rims. The 96' GT came w/ the silver colored 17x8 rims. They didn't polish the rims until 97' or 98'. I don't want to think what a big blob of bondo would do for the wheels balancing. Plus the bondo would probably crack everytime I pried off the cap to take off the wheel. Bondo is only designed to be no thicker than 1/16" or so.

Nice wheels though! Early Supra or Celica GT?

But these were also on the Celica GT-S model. I also grabbed the aluminum 5spd from the '84 Supra and put it and the wheels in my '80 Celica coupe. It's a work in progress...

<img src="http://www.speedtoys.com/~wedge/images/TB_ENG_4-8.jpg">

And a really bad shot...
<img src="http://www.speedtoys.com/~wedge/images/TB_RF_4-8.jpg">

Yeah I guess I have only seen the machined and clear-coated wheels on those cars. The silver looks nice. A lightweight flexible body filler should be fine and not throw balance off at all. But I would look for (or make) a set of blank covers. I made hubcaps for my Impulse out of aluminum 1/8" sheet stock. They came out nice, I machined them but it would have been easy to paint them - if you have the resources or the know-how, it should be simple.

-Jacob

Hey cool car. Good ol'e 20r! I think your obligated to drop a twin dcoe twin cam 2.0 from Japan in there!! I have a guy who had a boat load of Japan only engines imported to the usa. One guy had a huge engine in his 76 Celica? I mean come one now, those things only weighed 2400lbs! Looks like you upgraded or replaced the oem carb to a Weber? Again nice car, makes me miss my 170 510 2-door w/ the 1800sss engine. Had the 200zx 15" turbo rims. Heh, I guess I'm the king of wheel swaps! hehe.

wow.. intelligent conversation goign on in this post! something you don't wee too often in here anymore.

Ummm, now to add my $0.02..
Jacob.. nice ride for an "old beater car" !

I agree with Jeff on the non-black rims. I've seen a few Z31s with charcoal grey painted rims (the ones that look very similar to SE rims) and it looked pretty good.. this was on a red car though.. dunno what it'd look like on black, but again it looked pretty good on red.
if I can get a hold of my dad's digicam for a weekend again, I'll take a shot of it.. (it's sitting in a used car lot, btw)

hmm.. enough of this intelligent conversation..
<B><font color=red>YOUR CAR IS RICE!! </font></font>j/k :P

Man - I love getting compliments on my cars. I have ahd that Celica for almost 2 years now, and I often find people waiting by it when I come out of a store or something wanting to buy it from me.

Funny you should mention... I have a 18R-GR waiting for me to pay for. That's the 2.0L twincam motor from Japan. Has dual carbs from the factory so I'm not going to bother throwing on duals on my current motor. This car has 86k original miles BTW - I bought it from a lil ol lady here in the area - has every reciept since 1980 and the original window sticker!! The interior is absolutely perfect.

I would have thrown on duals a while ago, but there are strict emissions laws here in CA for cars 1974 and later. I have a loophole, but he is getting more and more tired of my continual mods... Hope he won't be pissed with the new motor - it will stay mostly stock until the money supply fills back up. Anyway, that is a weber 38/38. TRD header, and tons of other stuff. I also have a '81 Supra rear end with a 3.90 LSD and discs waiting to be installed...

Matt - the '87 Z31 turbo rims were factory charcoal in color. They look the same as the SE rims, but are actually 16x7. Funny thing - the '87-'89 N/A rims (came in silver and bare w/ clearcoat) look EXACTLY and I mean exactly like the SE rims - they are even 15x6.5 - they just have 20mm offset instead of 10mm. I have a set of each in my garage, and a set of '86 Z31T rims which are my fav. Z31 wheel. They are on my '89 300ZX. They look great on the Max and might even pass for stock in an inspection if someone didn't notice...

I can be the 'prince' of wheel swaps then. Also have a '68 510 w/ 6 spoke 280ZX rims (blasted/polished). I had Z32 rims on my '85 Turbo Z31 (and Z32 brakes...) and I have swapped rims on almost every car I have owned except my Pathfinder. I love finding larger OEM rims - throws people off with how nice they look, they bolt right on (usually) and they are a great cost effective option. I really like doing the blast/polish the lip thing. Makes them look almost like Panasports (which I would love to have on the Celica for next years's track season).

Thanks for the conversation - it's quite fun. I really like the 'Stang rims and think I might do that. I might also go with the '97-'99 SE rims if I can find some just to preserve ride quality and tire replacement costs. See which comes first, in order after the Eibachs/Tokicos.

Later,

Jacob
-=WhiteRice Racing=- (J/K)

Ohhhh 68' 510. No fender lights and the cool log dash! The pre 69' 510s had the better x-member and shorter struts! hehe. ah memories!

ok so the general consensus is not to paint em black??? man, that sux, i really wanted to try that. I still might. I haven't decided. thanks for the input guys.

well, i'm gonna do it anyway! i dont see why not. can you guys give me some reasons not to?

I say go for it and post pic's