Curb Rash CCW Help!
 

Ok so today was a bad day and on my way out of the driveway I misjudged where this little concrete retaining wall was and I totally clipped it with my back driver side wheel.

I think it looks worse in person as some scrapes are pretty deep. Is there any fixing this? Or should I just forget it and start saving for a new rim?

I figured the only possibility is sanding with progressively finer grit sandpaper and eventually polishing compound.

Anybody have any experience or advise?

Thanks.

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-V...o/IMAG0061.jpg

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-d...o/IMAG0060.jpg

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-w...o/IMAG0058.jpg

Yep, sand it and then throw on some Adams metal polish. It'll be good as new.

Totally fixable.

I'd start around 600 grit, and start working your way up to 2500, then hit it with a polish.

If the 600 isn't potent enough, slowly work your way to a more aggressive grit until the damage is gone. No sense of starting off with a grit that is more than you need.

Ok, any suggestions on which grit sandpaper? I've done some polishing of really crappy metal before but never anything that has this much luster.

Man you must have posted the same time as I did. Sounds like a plan. Thanks for the responses.

Needless to say, I'm pretty pissed at myself.

The beauty of polished aluminum is that you can remove as much material as you need and progressively go with a finer grit and then polish it out. I did that to the CCW's I had and turned out great.

right on. ive done this. only downside i had was had to polish the whole wheel(s) to make it look even, as the repaired spot will look brand new if u take ur time

Fixable, but man you gotta hate that first feeling you get when you curb rash your nice wheels. LOL

Well I'm feeling better about it now. Maybe I'll tackle it later this week. I think I already have all the sandpaper from my exhaust polishing project. I'll post the results. Thanks guys.

If it doesn't work out you could always sell them to me for 1/4 the price. ;)

Agreed on this process. A few years back I curbed a set of Fikse wheel in a drive thru and used this process. Have the tire demounted to make it easier on you.

First thing is get rid of that dam curb buddy...

Hey your just across the street!

Yeah, this might just be the straw that makes me find a new house. Greetings neighbor.

Anyway... so I couldn't stand it any longer and I started attacking this today. I started with the 600 grit but it just wasn't cutting it. The next one up I had was 320. I also soaked it in soapy water which may or may not have effected anything. The first pic is before and the second pic is after about an hour and half of sanding. Seems like this might just work. I'll resume back with the 600 tomorrow.
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-B...o/IMAG0109.jpg
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-b...o/IMAG0110.jpg

It will definitely work! It's a pita but the more patient you are and the more gradually you use finer and finer grit paper, you will have a better result. Nothing worse than spending a ton of time on it just to have a couple deeper scratches show through in the end. Ask me how I know.

Holy crap it worked. So today I wasn't even planning on working on this but the more I walked by it the more my mind made me do it.

So I hit it with the 600 grit for literally like 5 minutes. Then the only sandpaper I had left was 2000 grit. So I wet sanded with several pieces of that for about 20 minutes. I finally said screw it and grabbed the mothers cone style foam buffer, my power drill, the white diamond metal polish and went at it.

I'm actually amazed. I really can't even tell where the damage was except for the scrapes on the tire.

Thanks for the help guys. I knew the LS1Tech crew would come through!
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-q...o/IMAG0117.jpg

Looks great!:) Amazing what a little sandpaper and metal polsih will do.

Well done. This is the beauty of fully polished wheel! The ugly side is when it rains.

Looks amazing! Glad to know the sandpaper did the trick

I'm gonna be doing this on my classics this weekend. I hit a curb for the first time in my life yesterday..

I had to do the samething to mine once and it came out great.