Plasti-Dip + Spare

CrimsonCountry

New member
I have been toying with the idea of testing out the plasti-dip spray on my spare for some time after seeing it done all over the internet. The main draw being its cheap and reversible. The latter being very important as I may end up getting tired of the all black look after a while.

As the title suggests, I have only sprayed the spare and just put it on for a few test pics to get a feel of what the end result will look like. Overall, I am very pleased with the outcome. I was a little hesitant at first due to idea of black on black blending in and being too much but the flat black really offset the black paint. My only concern is how it will hold up over time and cleaning the wheels. From what I've read on other forums, it holds up fairly well in daily driving but is still fairly easy to peel off.

The only prep work I did on the wheel was simply making sure the wheel was clean. That's pretty much it. I didn't really put a lot of thought into it as I just wanted to quickly get the coats on (3 by the way) to see what it looked like. If and when I do my other 4 wheels, I will be a little more thorough.

I am still undecided as I really like the sport alloy look but I think I will do the other four whenever I have another free weekend. After all, its temporary so worst case I will just peel it off. I will continue to monitor the wear as I mounted the spare upside down for my trip home tomorrow to see how the road debris treats it.

What do you guys think? Yay or Nay?

Here are the pics :snacker:
1.jpg~original

17.jpg~original

3.jpg~original

6.jpg~original

9.jpg~original

11.jpg~original

15.jpg~original
:snacker:
 
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I think it looks bad ass, i want to do this too but was worried about it peeling off over time and having it look like crap if you didn't peel the rest off or re spray it. Looks great tho, do em all and lemme know haw it holds up :)
 
Looks great!

I think it looks bad ass, i want to do this too but was worried about it peeling off over time and having it look like crap if you didn't peel the rest off or re spray it. Looks great tho, do em all and lemme know haw it holds up :)

Looks great. Love to know what the long term wear looks like?

Thanks! I think it looks awesome too. It will definitely make it stand out more among the other 4runners. I was afraid it would look cheap but the slight texture and matte black looks just right.

I would drive around with the spare on for a while but its still the stock size while my main tires are 265/70s. Instead, I've just reverse mounted the spare so it takes all the road debris and will check it out after a few thousand miles. I cant wait to see the results myself and will keep you updated.

Also, I was curious how it would clean given the texture...so I threw some dirt and mud on it and let it dry. To my surprise, it cleaned easily. I tried to scuff it up too with no luck. Good news so far.

Do I see a red Mustang in the reflection?

Yes!! Its my granddad's toy. Its a '95 5.0 convertible, black on red. He wanted a cheap, fast convertible to mess around with on the weekends.
 
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looks really good!! But I may be a little biased.... hahaha

You will be pleasantly surprised as to how well it holds up
 
Ha thanks tech. Your wheels were actually one of the ones that made me want to paint mine.

I noticed in your build thread that you used 4 or 5 coats on your wheels. I was under the impression that after 3, each additional coat made it easier and easier to scratch off (kind of like spray paint with too many coats making it mushy). Although yours seems to be holding up really well so this may not be the case. I used 3 on my spare and it was pretty hard to scuff...I tried rubbing very hard and it never scratched.

Also, I saw that you had left your center caps on. I think i'm going to leave mine off as I like the look of the exposed lugs and hub. The only problem is that my rear hubs are rusted so I will probably end up spraying them as well.
 
I forgot to mention that my first 2 coats were very very light....

So maybe I just got lucky with the right amount of paint that actually went on the rim. It would be nice to leave off my caps, but underneath is just ugly! My sr5 rims don't look like yours with the hub exposed, plus there's a little rust. After it's all said and done, I'm very happy. Yours looks great!
 
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Either way, yours looks great and appears to be holding up well. My 3 coats were very slow and thorough so we probably have about the same amount on there. I may be waiting a little longer now to do mine as i'm about to get a set of Terra Grapplers and I would hate to have to repaint them again that soon if the techs screw it up.

Interesting, I wasn't aware the SR5 hubs were any different. My front hubs look great with the black cap but the rear is just the indented, rusty hub but I'm just going to paint it too. Again, thank for the compliments.
 
so how did you do this? i was thinking about it, but im debating how to.

mask off the tire? deflate the tire and slide newspaper under the wheel? and when you peeled off the masking tape, or whatever you used, did you have any problems with it taking the plastidip off the wheel with it?
 
:thumb3: Im sold!! Definitely gonna plasti-dip my wheels and experiment with other spots. Looks good!

Thanks. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by how good it actually looks once its on there. I've seen plenty of bumpers, grills, badges, etc that look just as good plasti-dip'd too. Keep us updated.

so how did you do this? i was thinking about it, but im debating how to.

mask off the tire? deflate the tire and slide newspaper under the wheel? and when you peeled off the masking tape, or whatever you used, did you have any problems with it taking the plastidip off the wheel with it?

As I mentioned earlier, I didn't get too technical with my prep seeing as this was just a trial run with my spare. However, with that being said, I really don't know of anything else you would need to do besides just make sure the wheel is clean.

The only thing I did to guard against over spray was wedge index cards in b/w the tire and rim, making sure that they overlapped one another.

As for the plasti-dip coming off with the tape/card removal, this only becomes an issue once the dip starts to dry. To avoid this, simply take them off as soon as you are done spraying and there wont be anything sticking. I left them on b/w each coat though (30 min b/w coats) and didn't have any issues.
 
The only thing I did to guard against over spray was wedge index cards in b/w the tire and rim, making sure that they overlapped one another.

As for the plasti-dip coming off with the tape/card removal, this only becomes an issue once the dip starts to dry. To avoid this, simply take them off as soon as you are done spraying and there wont be anything sticking. I left them on b/w each coat though (30 min b/w coats) and didn't have any issues.



thats an excellent idea. well... there is another item added to the to do list. i was just going to paint the wheels with a wheel spray paint, but i am liking the fact that you can use it as a "trial" run to see if you like it. if not, you can just take it off. :nicethread:
 
Exactly, the reversibility of this mod was one of the main reasons I chose the plasti-dip. I had thought about painting mine too but I like the sport alloy wheels too much to permanently change them. Plus, I like the slightly textured look and finish of the the plasti-dip vs the rattle can. Although, as with anything else, the final texture varies based on the applied layer's thickness.

And yea, the notecards were a quick and easy fix for me.
 
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I think you need to add a good floor jack and jack stands to your shop.

Oh yea - looks good.

Ha, thanks. And I didn't actually use that one. I just had it out to make sure it was working properly as the previous owner said it had gotten stuck at one point. That would have taken forever.

Off topic: Your avatar always cracks me up...used to watch that movie all the time.
 
I'll be installing my FJ coils and spacers in a few weeks and I think that I'm really considering doing this!

Hmmm...
 
For some reason the pictures aren't showing up from me from the original post. Anyone else have some pictures of this to post?
 

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