I am Plasti Diping my rims this week before I put them back on. I have the rattle cans and am curious with one thing. My wheels have the ///M badge above the BMW center cap. If I tape over this and spray them, will this gap be prone to chipping since the little 1" x .5" rectangle breaks the seal? Would it be better to just spray the wheel and then scrape off just the badge?
Here is an example of the rim with the little decal.
Spray the whole thing, very delicately cut around the badge and peel the plastidip off of it. Should be a piece of cake.
Additional tip: Don’t put cards or whatever between the rim and tire. Just mask on the tire about and inch from the rim and make sure you lay very thick coats on the edge so it wraps around the face of the rim. Then you can go around later and just peel the 1 inch wide layer off of the tire. The reason I suggest this is because over time the plastidip will start to fray and come loose at the edges if it is only on the face of the wheel. If you allow the plastidip to wrap around the edge of the rim, it will have more to hold on to and last longer.
Thanks for the tip. That was my idea on both. I saw some people peel it off the wheels and had no issues with it but didn’t think of the wrapping. The only thing I am planning on taping was the back of the wheel where it met the car. Are you suggesting taping on the tire to help with the peel off instead of just spraying on it?
Just spray the whole wheel don’t matter it will come right off. As for the badge there might be a big enough gap for you not even to cut it.
Tip: Lets the cans soak in hot water Till Warm. Shake cans extremely well! Do thin coats and do many coats. When I say many do 9+ Thin Coats. The less Coats you do the Harder it will be to get off later.
Thanks. I was planning on 5 but will continue to layer it up. I essentially have a can a wheel if needed and with the buffalo roads, was planning on loading it up. Here goes nothing tonight if the rain holds off.
Yes. I felt that it made cleanup a bit easier after the fact to have a hard edge of plastidip to peel off instead of faded overspray to have to rub.
Forgot about this. I keep a bucket of hot water to soak the cans in between layers. This definitely helps a lot. As for 9+ coats, not too sure about that. Plastidip is very easy to cover with thick coats. Basically the idea is to have a thick coverage regardless of the number of layers so that it will come off easier later.
Also, it sounds like you’re going to spray the barrel of the wheels? I did this and regretted it. It wasn’t noticeable for me and was a huge pain in the ass to remove later on because the surface on the barrel isn’t as smooth as the rest of the wheel.
Well From all the cars I have done for my customers plastidip will actually wear off over time and those extra layers are needed to keep the thickness. That’s my opinion.
Well as Far as your thick coats, Its easier to make it looks rough that way. If you have enough heat on the cans and a warm enough room then ya go for the thick coat method if you want. If you want a paint like finish Then Do warm thin Coats. My .02
5 coats is more than enough. I usually did 4 and everything peeled off in one big piece. It shouldn’t take more than 4 cans for 4 wheels.
But the real question is how long did you have the dip on your car before you pulled it off? That’s a big factor for sure…
Before setting the can down tip it upside down and spray a bit to clear the nozzle. Mine clogged very easily if I didn’t do this. I did ~5-6 light coats on my truck wheels and a year of dirt roads, muddy/rocky logging roads, snow, salt, whatever and they still look as good as the day I did it.
@Scott I told you I wasn’t the only one that does this.
i would recommend against plasti dip, it is impossible to have them look clean, you cant clean them with typical wheel cleaners and that will be needed with bmw brake dust
the brake dust does something to the coating and made it nearly impossible to take off without having to use chemicals
About a year.
Spray the whole wheel then peel
Also, instead of taping around the rim I placed a bunch of business cards between the rim and the lip…just be sure to get into the little gap with the dip
So far so good. Learned some things and didn’t come out too bad. Def layer up with that light spray at the beginning. I found that I needed to layer a few more on. When I socketed the rims back on I already beat it up and chipped some.
For touch ups, do you have to repeal everything or can you spray over in small areas?