I have the stock turbo twist wheels and I noticed that the top paint layer is actually starting to fade in places. I thought it was just dirty at first and tried a little claybar on it but it looks like that just takes more paint off!

Anyway, I'm wondering if anyone on here had their stock wheels refinished and how much it set them back? I have some minor curb rash so I could get that fixed while I'm at it as well. On the flip side, I know $1500 can buy a nice new set of wheels these days so I'm not sure it's worth it?

Thoughts?

 

You're looking at 75-150$ a wheel typically.

$1500 will get you a replica set of wheels. If you're after a nice name / set you're looking at $2500+ used or $3500+ new. Lots of options.

$600 to refinish a stock set....

You could always keep them as spares or a track set and spend the cash on an upgrade

Is it worth it? That's relative to th e individual.

Best of luck!

 

It is usually $200 per wheel for a like new finish. You can get cheaper but quality drops.

 

I was referring to something like a Forgestar wheel. Light and nice quality.

Maybe I'll get a quote on a refinish. The wheels are in pretty good shape overall, just some slight discoloring.

 

Alternative is to plasti-dip it. I changed mine from the silver to a black color using the matte finish, and it's awesome. All curb rash is gone. Amazing.

 

Change them out. I personally always hated the stock turbo twist wheels. Yes there light (if there hollow) but they date the car.
I have 19 inch iforged Essen, powder coated charcoal grey face, gloss black outter barrel (lip), satin black inner barrel. Left all the attaching bolts chrome and picked up some chrome lug bolts.
On my black car I get guys commenting all the time, and it's super tough finish. Looks just as good today as when I got it done three years ago.

 

I did the same thing, cheap and easy.

 

Also, the question was asked of how the plastidip survives changing a tire. Well, there were some scrapes within the lugnut holes, but you know what? About 4 coats of spot plastidip after a gentle gentle cleaning, and it's back in business. Total time spent: 4 elapsed minutes, and 3 of those minutes just shaking the can for the 4 coats. No need to even mask anything off.

I also had some more curb rash on it (f'ing San Francisco high curbs and my crappy technique for parallel parking on the left) and again, 4 coats of plastidip and it's done.

Plastidip is very easy to maintain.

BTW: Schwolneck -- awesome color scheme! I've got the same (in a cab). Black wheels look so much better than silver on that scheme.

 

any surface prep with plastic dip? no sanding? without surface prep, does the plastic dip show the gouges and marks?

 

no surface prep other than cleaning.

If you layer it enough on the marked / gouged areas, it will do a good job of covering things up.

 

No offense to the guys that have done the plasti dip thing, but... You're driving a 911 Turbo. If you like the looks of a plasti dipped wheel then more power to you, but this is basically the "in" thing to do for ricers and their Hondas for changing wheel color. It's a cheap solution, and that just doesn't fit with a Porsche IMO. I see guys doing this with beat up trucks too.

Why not just get them powder coated? A lot more durable, and you don't have recoat your wheels when that stuff gets scraped off.

 

BTW: You don't even need to remove the wheels to do the plastidipping. See the site dipyourcar.com (and a good place to order the material from) for a video on how to cover the caliper and rotors using a slit garbage bag.

I've even plastidipped my turbo intake ducts. I didn't want a carbon fiber and I didn't want to paint it because I wasn't sure if I'd like it. Plastidip just peels right off if you don't like it, so no permanent change if you don't want it. Left on for enough months, it'll "stain" the yellow paint, I'm sure, but in any case, I'm keeping the dark ducts.

Here's a pic of the car after doing the ducts (and before doing the wheels).

 

Don't forget about the tire mount and dismount, balancing, etc...figure another 150$ on top of the refinishing. This is always forgotten when pricing out wheels & refinishing.

 

I would normally get them powder-coated, sure. But there are advantages to plastidip over powdercoating or painting them. New curb rash looks like hell, even on a powdercoated wheel. The matte finish of the plastidip takes care of that. Living in San Francisco where parallel parking is the name of the game and with some odd-*** angles on the street, curb-rash is an eventuality. That was my reasoning.

And if I'd actually plastidipped my wheels yellow (or red, or white or anything but black), I would agree with you that it looks ricer. There's almost no way that someone can tell its plastidipped short of running their fingernail through it. It looks a lot better in person than you think it might.

And, oh, the cost. Forgot about that rationale.

Instead of powdercoating turbo-twists, I'd probably go retro with a Fuchs or something. I may still do that, and leave these as track tires at some point. Any one know if there are Fuchs or Fuchs lookalikes for the 996T measurements (18")?

 

Yeah, I don't think I will refinish them. Just doesn't seem the best bang for the buck. I also have the "non-hollow" turbo twist wheels, so they are heavy on top of it.

Now, is plasti-dip only available in black? Or are there other colors? Is it always a matte look? Doing something like that in gunmetal might look good on a silver car. Could be a solution until I find other wheels.

I also want to refinish the calipers; sounds like that runs about $800 for all four as well. They do it in a variety of colors but the red probably works best with a silver car.