Has anyone tried to clean their rims using a power washer on a very low setting? Curious to see if this would work to get that grime that seems to be glued onto my rims.

-Erik

 

nope, i just use a damp rag.

 

one of these...

 

When they get really dirty, I use Eimann Fabrik High Intensity Cleaner with a soft horsehair brush. It looks just like the $.99 round brush you see to clean the interior air vents. Works great.

Remember, most wheels are clearcoated. Ask yourself, would you use XXX on the paint on your car?

 

yup this works best.

 

It's not the ouside of the rims that's the problem. That dirt comes right off with just a wipe. I have a first gen CL, with the 3.0 rims that have the 8 million spokes. And in between the spokes is a textured finish where this dirt and grime sticks and is impossible to get off. Couple of guys just told me to try simple green, so I'll give that a shot.

 

If you take care of the protective coating that is on the rims out of the factory, by not using that acid stuff, your rims will be easier to clean with just a towel and water (for the most part). Over time, however, that coating wears off.

On our Land Rovers, I have used a power washer with mixed results. I found that it did a good job of removing the break dust if done within a couple weeks of the last cleaning, but if the stuff is "caked" and "baked" on after nearly a month of driving w/ the wheel being exposed to high temps (lots of breaking and hot weather) sometimes some acid break dust remover may be needed. If you got an electric or gas powerwasher, check it out, it's worth trying (I think it would work fine on our cars w/ stock breaks, not too much break dust).

 

I used my gas powered 2300 psi power washer to try and clean the black baked on brake dust from my legend rims and it didn't work.
I was surprised. I use the smallest nozzle and the rims just looked the same.

Nothing beats rim cleaner and a hard tooth brush.


Esti

 

i have SSR GT1 rims, and they have the double parallel spoke design...when i wanna clean inbetween the spokes, i have another sponge...it's about the size of a baseball card...it's one of those yellow sponges with the white fishnet type of covering more used for home-cleaning

that sponge works wonders in getting into tight places

 

Greased Lightning works wonders. That stuff gets most anything off. Even before wiping you can spray it & see the dirt fly off. Claybar helps with real dirty gunked on stuff. That's if you can take the wheel off to use it.