So, in the never ending quest to get the military tires on my truck, I picked up a set of aluminum wheels a few months ago in Denver. They're the shiny finish ones and I would have much preferred black ones. But at the price I paid and considering how hard it seems to be to find 16.5" wheels in a 8x170mm bolt pattern, I picked them up anyway. Made a few calls to some powder coaters to see how much it would cost to get them flat blacked. 25/wheel was pretty much the going rate. Then, two days ago I stumbled across a thread over on Ford Trucks where a guy said he'd used the Plasti-dip coating (same stuff you dip your hand tools into to put a coating on the handles) to paint his wheels. I thought I would give it a shot. And here's what happened.

Here's a side by side of one coated and one not.


And a closer shot of the coated one. I have some runs in the coating but I've only shot it once so far. I think I will get those runs out with more application.


Best part is, if I don't like the coating any more or if it gets damaged and looks like garbage, I can pee it off and reshoot it.

Now I'm wondering what black slots might look like.

That looks awesome !

It does look good but how expensive is the plastic?

If that stuff peels off, would a curb check, car wash, or hitting a rock 4-wheeling peel it off? Powdercoat for $25.00 a wheel seems very reasonable to get a whole new look.

A video of how easy it is to remove.

I wasn't able to see the pics at work behind my firewall for some reason. Now that I can see the pics, they look awesome. Excited to see them with tires mounted on your Bronco.

If that plastidip came in clear, that would make a great wheel protectant for the winter!!

Can't wait to see them on the truck!

Looks good! You peeked my interest, so I did some searching. Looks like people are having good luck with it even after a year.
The one thing I would be concerned with is doing it before the tires are mounted, seems like the tire will tear it off when you set the bead.

Well, the tire replacements came in. Got them all mounted up today. Now the question is:

Aluminum


or Black?

Which one do you like. I like them both. Nice part about doing it that way is you can change it when you want.

My problem is everyone does black wheels now. I used to really like them but they are so played out now. But either do look good.

Both! Tape em off so they alternate on the wheel...

Alum looks too plain, but as zoso said, black is becoming very popular, especially on our tow rigs!

Try opposite of most rims. Go black lip and polished center. Try something different.