DIY Wheel Refinishing - BBS Style 5s

[DerTee30]

When going the polished route, after the sanding is complete what kind of polish would you guys recommend using? I'm about to tackle polishing the lips on my style 19s and I want to get as close as possible to mirror finish.

[BATESY]

Nice write up. style 5's are a pain in the ass to get apart sometimes.

[dubbed21]

great write up!!

[sacrifice]

This is such a great writeup. Very thorough and its great to see a picture for every step taken.

Definitely sticky worthy.

When going the polished route, after the sanding is complete what kind of polish would you guys recommend using? I'm about to tackle polishing the lips on my style 19s and I want to get as close as possible to mirror finish.

I have found that lowes has a decent selection of buffing wheels and compounds that will allow you to achieve a mirror or very very close to a mirror finish. The compounds they have come in small tubes and have different ratings/grits, just like sandpaper. You can easily get a bench grinder decent enough to polish lips, multiple compounds, and a wheel for each compound for about $75.

[irishguy0224]

Thanks for this! I have some Style 5's en route to me today and will be refinishing them as well. But will be polishing the lips. Awesome write up.

[Vodadubz]

I am at the middle of this process... as is my first intent on refurbishing a pair of wheels...
So glad a friend showed up with this thread. Excellent and very helpful!

Mines will be mounted on a VW, so 5x100 re-drill: DONE.





I did not knew how to get the bolts out of the barrel so I ended up TRYING to sand/polish the bolt heads while they were still mounted...
I attached some (many!) 400 or 600 wet sand paper cut offs to the 10mm (?) deep socket and went 1 by 1 on the bolt heads with the impact driver (power tool)... Very tedious process! You can see some progress in below... But this sh*t took me a lot of time and the grit paper shredded to pieces almost in every bolt head, requiring a lot of sand paper pieces, time and patience.




Anyone knows of any other BETTER way to polish the bolt heads???
Cannot afford to buy right now.

[Dangerwillrbnsn]

Place a punch in the indent of the back of the bolt. Hit punch with hammer to remove. Place bolt into a drill, spin to polish bolt.

[Vodadubz]

As simple as that. Thanks mate!

[roof_rack]

I just did this starting at 400 wet, 1000 wet, and then 2000 wet. I would not recommend any lower grit than 400 wet unless you have some serious abrasion like on the OP's wheels...cuts the aluminum way to deep, and it is alot of work to get it back to a smooth finish.

Here are mine, Stripper, 400 wet, 1000 wet, 2000 wet, No.7 Polishing Compound... tada!

Also, the stripper i used worked much much better than the Jasco...took everything off in one coat. I'll go downstairs and check the brand on that for you guys.




This is hand polishing ONLY, no wheel used here.

[BeemerBuyer]

Thanks for the compliments everyone! I appreciate it.

Place a punch in the indent of the back of the bolt. Hit punch with hammer to remove. Place bolt into a drill, spin to polish bolt.

This is great advice!

[Take2]

Place a punch in the indent of the back of the bolt. Hit punch with hammer to remove. Place bolt into a drill, spin to polish bolt.

That method takes for ever just FYI

[staystetti]

You probably need to strip the clear off of your bolts as well. Mine had a ton on them.

[Wu! Wraps]

bmw style 5's bbs rc090 17x8 et 20

sup sup, so this is a lil project of my own. picked these up mid week and have torn them apart & stripped all the clearcoat off 4 out of 5 rims. the 5th one i can't get the bolts out for the life of me!... all hardware has been soaked in vinegar for a day and cleaned up today. needs another soaking or some time with a steal cloth. plan is to get the lips polished and centers will be a dark gray/ dark gray hardware/ dark gray inner barrels... these will be going on my 1991 bmw 325i convertible (e30).

update:
got the 5th rim taken apart and dropped all wheels off at perfection powder coating in puyallup wa 2538750010. cost for powdercoating all 5 inner hoops, 5 faces, and 170 bolt heads in a dark gray color with tax was $595.00. powdering the 170 bolt heads was $46.00 with tax by itself!... well see how it all comes out!

also found a machine shop Proflections Metal Polishing 2537356111 in Auburn Wa that is gonna polish all the outer lips once back from powdercoater for $65per wheel so, $355 with tax.

next will be ordering some caps, bbs decals, nice metall valve stems & bbs valve caps & lastly tires....

[Wu! Wraps]

update:

so got the wheels back from powder coating. came out great! dropped off the 5 barrels at the metal polishers to get the lips done. still need to get someone to paint match the centers with the powder the shop gave me, put them back together, & find some tires for them! coming along nicely!

[Wu! Wraps]

update:

got my bbs replica resin decals, looks pretty good!