Restoring 1970 Fleetwood wheel covers...

[Cape Cod Fleetwood]

Recommend not having a loaded weapon close by, you will be tempted...

Did you know there are 127 grooves around the hub?

Wheel cover thoroughly washed with soap and water and allowed to dry.
Polished with Blue Magic vs Flitz, Blue Magic, IMHO, lets you wipe off finger prints
easier, and I'll be handling these a lot.

With a QTip dipped in paint thinner, remove your fresh polish from every area you'll be painting.

Acquire a good mood, comfortable seating, good lighting, and an adult beverage.

Paint used was Rustoleum semi-gloss black with a very small brush, QTip dipped in paint thinner
to immediately fix any sins, which are numerous, frequent, and unending. Rags dipped in thinner
made it easier to 'clean up' the ring around the outside.

It took 3.5 hours just to do the black trim on 1 wheel cover. Went to Hobby Lobby yesterday to acquire
a couple of smaller brushes in an effort to expedite process, do a better job and save my sanity with the
next 3.

Emblems to be done after all the black trim is complete.

Before and after pics attached.

Now to get a tooth extracted and that's more fun than this project.

[James Landi]

Laurie, I recall a post where a club member endorsed using the kitchen dishwasher as the first stage in the process; however, his spouse was not terribly enthusiastic about this idea-- Happy day,  James

[Highwayman68]

WOW that is insane, but well worth it

[chrisntam]

When you're done, I'll send you mine to do.



What was that address again?

Wonder how the factory did that?  It does look good!

[Cape Cod Fleetwood]

Thanks guys... This is another of those ONLY ONCE jobs.
When they're complete with emblems done too, I'll post pics again.

[Cape Cod Fleetwood]

Finished a couple of days ago, did I mention there are 127 grooves on each wheel cover?

Once I got better/smaller brushes the job went a lot quicker. After wash and dry, after polishing,
after removing polish from the areas to be painted, the paint job is roughly 6 hours per wheel cover.
Thanks to Wes for recommending the paint and colors, they're perfect. All they need now is another
light polish with Blue Magic to remove all my finger prints.

Before and after pics

[Highwayman68]

Very nice job, you do excellent work!

[chrisntam]

I drove my car without the caps for a few days, don't recall why, but after I put them back on, it looked like the car had it's jewelry on.

The caps look great!  I hope to see them in person at the next GN - Albakerkey, NM.

[35-709]

   Very nice --- a labor of love.

[Cadillac Fleetwood]

Great job, Laurie!

Charles Fares

[Cape Cod Fleetwood]

Thanks guys, glad this one is over. Covers repolished and back in the trunk with towels between them.

[benx13]

Great work. Time consuming but worth the time.

[Hillbillycat]

Hey, your thread inspired me and made me restore the hubcap emblems of my 1956 Sedan Deville, too. Use 1-Shot lettering enamel applied with syringes and ultra thin needle to fill the recessions.

[Highwayman68]

Hey, your thread inspired me and made me restore the hubcap emblems of my 1956 Sedan Deville, too. Use 1-Shot lettering enamel applied with syringes and ultra thin needle to fill the recessions.

It;s always great to hear when another Cadillac is restored to original!

Glad to see that Laurie's post inspired you.

[Cadman-iac]

Hey, your thread inspired me and made me restore the hubcap emblems of my 1956 Sedan Deville, too. Use 1-Shot lettering enamel applied with syringes and ultra thin needle to fill the recessions.

I cleaned and polished all 9 of the ones I have, and I took the centers out and buffed them on a buffing wheel, then I attempted to paint one of them with minimal success. I wasn't really happy with it so I buffed it off again and put it back together.
I would like to see how yours turned out, and what paint and process you used.
Even though mine are bright and shiny now, brass colored centers alone are not as nice as the original painted ones.
If you don't mind, you can PM me with the info. Many thanks for any help you can offer.

Rick

PS: Really nice job on yours Laurie! Patience of a Saint!

[Cape Cod Fleetwood]

Thanks guys, appreciate all the scratches behind the ears.

Remember the nightmare last year restoring/painting all the roof trim (in and out) when the roof (in and out) was restored
last winter? "Halo" paint job....Eesh... Nothing is easy

[Hillbillycat]

Hi, I didn´t take pics during the process unfortunately but can take some of the finished product.
I had tried a super fine brush (scale model stuff) first but without success. You definitely need a small syringe and 27G (0.4mm) needle!

Place the hubcap on one of these vintage  kitchen cake rotary plates. This way you can rotate the whole hubap with ease while applying paint. If using 1 shot paint I advise you to use the hardener. Otherwise the paint will peel if oversprayed with clear coat.....ask me how I know......:-(
And use a cutter or razor blade to scrape off the residues after the paint has dried to touch up the rised brass parts. I wasn´t able to paint these fine lines without overfilling the grooves here and there. Oh, get a Mack 2240 wipe out tool (pinstriping equipment). This is definitely a big help to reduce paint residues while it is still wet.

The 1 Shot paint I used was black, white, process blue, fire red, purple.
Had used these since I had them on hand. Had to mix fire red with purple to create a darker red.

The centers in bare brass look very cool, indeed. I was tempted to leave them this way, too after the initial painting with the brish didn´t turn out too well. But the whole effort payed off since these hubcaps look so much better now painted. I´ll take some pics and post.

[Cadman-iac]

Hillbillycat,
Thank you for all the information,  that's what I needed to know.  And yes, if you can post a picture that would be great.
  If I can ask, where did you get your "One Shot" paint and the pinstriper's tool?

  Rick

[Cadman-iac]

Laurie,
I was curious, how did you apply the paint to your interior trim? It turned out great.

Rick

[carlhungness]

       Once again I'm curious to know if the paint is going to stick. Research shows that on chrome 9at least) an adhesion promoter such as UPOL Grip 4 should be used. I'm getting ready to do the LaS hubcap emblems on my '37 and will definitely spray the areas I am going to paint red.
    Lovely work here, great job and I appreciate your patience.