Today I rotated my tires and took the opportunity to detail the wheels. After washing I clayed the wheels including the barrels. During polishing with a foam pad and M205, by hand, I noticed it wasn't removing the scratches/swirls on the polished exterior of the coated aluminum wheels. I tried a microfiber and Megs UC to no avail. It appears these swirls may be under the factory clear coat? They cannot be felt with a fingernail and the surface feels smooth. Has anyone else seen this on factory coated wheels? Or maybe I just need to get more aggressive with a powerball or flitz and a different compound/polish? I'm leery of removing to much of the factory coating. Thanks!
Are They Under The Clear?
- Thread starter ORANGERT
- Start date
Setec Astronomy
Well-known member
Yes, under the clear.
EXPDetailing
New member
Try machine polishing them instead of elbow grease.
RaysWay
Autopia Specialist
Are those factory forged Alcoas? Or replicas?
Our wholesale manager here just ordered those same wheels (replicas in a different finish) for his Dodge Ram 1500 and they had the same imperfections under the clearcoat, so he ended up returning them. But if they're the factory forged Alcoas, those scratches should be in the clearcoat and should be removed with a metal polish. You'll see much better results with a metal specific polish.
Flitz would be a great choice, use their buff ball unless you have forearms like Popeye.
Our wholesale manager here just ordered those same wheels (replicas in a different finish) for his Dodge Ram 1500 and they had the same imperfections under the clearcoat, so he ended up returning them. But if they're the factory forged Alcoas, those scratches should be in the clearcoat and should be removed with a metal polish. You'll see much better results with a metal specific polish.
Flitz would be a great choice, use their buff ball unless you have forearms like Popeye.
Thanks Vega for the response! They are forged stock 22" wheels ( 2014 Ram R/T ). Would the metal polish be ok to use as I'm sure they are coated? They have looked this way since day one, but I waited till I had them off the truck to polish. I know the coating on my previous Ram wheels was almost like a plastic coating of some sort.
4u2nvinmtl
New member
Just out of curiosity are they DuraBrite coated Alcoa's?
RaysWay
Autopia Specialist
Nice wheels
Yep, Flitz is safe on clearcoat and would be my first choice. Are you going to coat the wheels after polishing?
Ronkh
Wax Waster
wholesale mamager ?!?!?!?!?!?!?! <perk>
Nice wheels
Are you going to coat the wheels after polishing?
I'm not sure who made them for Ram trucks, but they are the stock wheels that came on my 2014 Ram Sport R/T ( 22" polished aluminum ).
I am going to coat them after polishing with CQuartz DLux. I'm not very hopeful the scratches/swirls will come out though. I tried a spot with a 3" pad, UC, and my PC da. No difference. We'll see how the Flitz and my drill does. No retailer has the Flitz around here, so I'll be placing an order and keeping my fingers crossed!