So I got these Maido/Maya GR5 rims pretty cheap. The previous owner painted them white and the lips have been curbed. I disassembled them and started polishing them and realized they were anodized lips.

I went to Lowe's and found some Roebic drain opener. It's 100% sodium hydroxide. I used about 2 tablespoons per gallon of water. Soaked the lip in the solution for ~20 minutes and most of the anodization bubbled off. Now I can fix the lip and polish it without worrying about any drab looking anodization. Polished about half the rim then I got tired. I'll need to get a new polishing wheel.

I started stripping the paint on the centers and found that the metal looks pretty good. I may just keep the metal look or powder coat it something else. I haven't decided yet.

Just thought this method of taking off anodization was pretty cool for those folks that have damaged anodized lips either from curbage or from harsh chemicals. I'll probably coat it with some Zoopseal to protect it.

 

fun project

 

It's going to be a lot of work, but looking good so far

 

Wow, looks like you have some work ahead of you! Are those 19's?

 

Man, you got those at a steal...great find and good luck on the project.

 

Yes they are. They seem to be about the same weight as my cheap one piece "fake-look, two-piece" 18" Ruff 278 rims. The 19x10.5 rim weighs the same as the 18x9.5 rim (~27lbs). I'll probably be selling those once I get this project done. I think the barrels are forged and the centers are cast.

 

Nice! Keep us posted on the DIY.

 

Yeah man, I thought it was. Plus the man drove all the way down from Oklahoma city to deliver it. I knew it was going to be a bit of work to strip the paint and repolish, but I couldn't pass it up.

The thing is the tires on my 18's are pretty close to done maybe ~2-3K miles more. If I were to replace those, I'll probably spend $700-$1000, depending on the performance characteristics of the tire. I've also noticed that the prices of 19" tires and 18" tires are somewhat converging. So I figured why not just roll on my 17's for now, sell the 18's, and with a little work roll on some nice 19's.

 

Do you have to run spacers to roll on the stock 17's with the Wilwood BBK?

 

looks promising

 

I don't think I have to, but I do have 15mm spacers on the front and 20mm spacers on the rear right now.

 

So I'm trying to figure out how to mount the TPMS. I searched around and I found that you can use a strap. Or now they have these nifty brackets which uses the old valve stem and mounts the TPMS in this fashion:



or use this which replaces the valve stem:



and mounts like this:



When I got new sensors for my Ruff 278 wheels, I brought my car to the Infiniti dealer to go through the the ID registration of the sensors to the BCM. I think this involved using the Consult tool and a transmitter activation tool (J-45295). I believe the transmitter activation tool is held up against the valve stem to reset the sensor. If I use these adapters to mount my sensor, the whole TPMS sensor is going to be inside the wheel. I guess my question is if the activation tool has enough range to get through the tire wall and reset the sensor. My guess is yes, but if not I may just get my old sensors out of my old wheels which are registered to the BCM already (what a pain).

 

One down, three to go. Sanded the centers down and then polished it a bit. The paint was real thick, I'll probably go get the other ones sand blasted.

 

Looks pretty damn good. Why don't you just use a chemical paint stripper?

 

Thanks. Initially, I tried using paint stripper from Home Depot. It softened the paint, but was still difficult to get off. Got some aircraft paint stripper from Autozone. This stuff works better, it literally burns your skin. The coat of white paint was really thick, probably a good 1 mm on the spokes. It took about three and a half cans to get down to the metal. The metal was kind of rough so it needed to be sanded down. Cleaning out the holes for the screws is also a pain.

I may go get a quart of the aircraft stuff and let it soak in there overnight. Or I figured I could give sandblasting a shot.