Refurbish Cragars at Home

[ZiggyL78]

Ken Seggie

From:
[email protected]
To:
Guy Richards

Thu, Jan 18 at 12:23 a.m.

ello All.
I have been restoring wheels, for the past couple of years during the winter. 2nd Gen Camaros & Chevelles are popular and sell fast. I wanted wheels for my 65 Dodge and decided on Cragar SS.

I went looking for a rough set to practice on and bought 2 Cragar GTs. They are just Cragar SS wheels that are painted grey. I found 2 for $120 with 2 with good Pirellis. It was such a great deal, I gave the guy what he was asking. I couldn't wait to get home to see if there was chrome under the paint. There was, so I stripped them down with paint remover and a razor blade. Underneath the wheels were nice except that the chrome had blotchy areas everywhere.

First I tried some chrome wrap Vinyl. The stuff is amazing but, it is not easy to use on objects that have more than 1 angle. I practiced for a couple of hours with the wrap. Things like the spokes were easy but the rim with 3 steps was tough. I made templates for the whole wheel as I have 20 wheels to do.

My next attempt was chrome spray paint. New brands of chrome paint are coming out every day. I tried over 10 brands. A few looked OK but nothing had that mirror chrome look. I had heard that Revell had a good one. You must remember Revell from the old days as they made model car kits. At $60 a can, it should be good. It's a small can and it will only do 2 wheels. The can is less than, half the size of a regular can. (150 Ml )Prepping the wheel is where all the time goes. Any areas where the wheel is pitted have to be sanded smooth and any area that has peeling chrome needs to be sanded.

Once done properly the wheel looks amazing. As new. I don't know if chrome paint will get any better as it's almost perfect now. I'm having trouble getting pics up. I have lost a lot of my computer skills. Very frustrating.

[chevyman0429]

I did my front cragars with some chrome spray paint from home depot came out very well but u can tell up close.

[ZiggyL78]

They look great! Which brand did you use? Rustoleum? Did you use a black base coat? I found that light coats didn't work and you pretty well need a wet coat each time.

[muscle_collector]

i am totally amazed that something out of a rattle can could look like that.

[chevyman0429]

I don’t remember off the top of my head what i used but i did one light coat then 4 heavy coats i let they fully dry wet sanding with 320 in between each coat .

[Lynn]

I bet that stuff would work on the mylar trim on 69 Camaro door panels.

[Steve Shauger]

Here's a test of several spray chrome paints. Revell is the winner: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAq-05hwYk4

[EZ Nova]

Nice thank you for the info.

Need to paint a few things.