alexdi

In a fit of brilliant driving, I recently added a small scrape to a wheel on my Maxima S. It isn't serious enough to merit refinishing the wheel ($90 at the dealership), but I'd prefer not to leave the aluminum exposed.

Does anyone know of a paint that matches the color of the stock wheels?

STARR

iTrader: (1)

rims are not painted, they are clear coated

alexdi

Are you sure? It looks to me like clear-coat over paint.

SCR_speed

exposed aluminum is not a big deal. its not going to rust or anything

STARR

iTrader: (1)

How deep did you go, I would let it be, maybe throw a layer of wax on the wheels, but Im almost 100% sure they are just cast aluminum, and after they come out of the mold and inspected, are clear coated.

alexdi

I don't think natural aluminum sparkles like that. This gash is only about an inch long, but it is pretty evident when the wheel comes up. Surely there must be a paint to match that generic silver?

goog67

rims are painted...nissan damaged my front rim and had to get it painted and clear-coated.if there was no paint then why is the color different on the 09 to the 10 max rims?

Car Addict

Auto parts stores sell all kinds of shades of touch up paint
http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/de...1152&ppt=C0255
http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/de...1152&ppt=C0255

OneWhtMax

wheels are painted if they werent u would not u would not see a difference on a scratch

2010BlackMax

Yes the rims are painted. And to do this right, you should have them refurbished. But if you don't want to spend the money, I understand. The first place I would check would be Nissan. They may have the paint there. Actually they should if they can have them refurbished. After that I would check a few local body shops. They may have the code there. Then check the autostores, and guess and check.

You will have to sand it down to get it fairly smooth, or else it will just look like you threw paint over that mark, it will probably look worse that way.

Good luck, post up some pics of what you decide to do and the end result

alexdi

O'Reilly was the suggestion of the Nissan dealership I called. They apparently farm out their wheel work to some local firm.

http://www.audiworld.com/tech/ext43.shtml

That's what needs to be done. I'm opting for touch-up paint alone because I don't want to put in the effort for so small a scrape, and so I can minimize the area that needs to be painted. Until I find out the exact paint code, sanding down a larger area risks having that much more space mismatched.

I'll post an update when I make some progress.

TintNinja

I wouldn't have it repainted. One of my wheels had to be repaired due to a good gash in the wheel. If I had known they sand all the original off and repaint the whole wheel, I would have never done it.

alexdi

If they match the paint color to the other wheels, what difference how much they paint?

djdavebse

even if its the same paint when you sand off whats there and repaint it. it will look different from the different wheels

TintNinja

Well, I balanced my wheels last week and when installing the new weights on the inside of the wheel I used brake cleaner to clean the area, as I have done with any other wheel, where the weights needed to go. Well, the brake cleaner drained down and ate the paint. All the other wheels were fine and have never had this happen before. Sure enough had to be on my car. It had to be completely repainted. Luckily, they had to repaint it anyhow due to their screw up so I didn't have to pay for it.

Now I'll always have to be careful what I put on that wheel compared to what I know is safe on the other wheels. That is why I wouldn't have it redone.

Think of it this way. If you had to have one of your doors or panels repainted, do you think it will match up perfectly? No...and it will probably fade differently over time or even start peeling in that section.

Although, the wheels, you will probably never tell because they are not right next to each other but still, now I will always have to be extra careful with that particular wheel and keep track if its on the front or the rear.

alexdi

I did have my door repainted. That was 5000 miles ago. It's absolutely indistinguishable from the rest of the car. Your wheel should have been the same story.