alrighty. so... few months ago i bought a pair of the 5 lug silverado rims like the ones that came on my 98 silverado. they are alloy rims. they got some road rash on the lips but nothing a die grinder cant kill. and im gonna put up a before and during and after pic show up. now my truck is green. you think the black rim would look good in summer? the regular rims are winter. do you think i should leave the very edge of the rim lip chrome? or brushed aluminum? or all black? im sand blasting the rims as well because the nasty brake dust cake on back. but yea you think black looks good>?

 

My vote's for all black, unless you've got massive rims, adding silver or chrome will look tatty.

Green and Black sounds like a stylin' summer combo.

 

This is what I did with my Blazer rims:












If the rims below are the ones you are referring to, I would leave the sluminum part alone and paint the rough cast part of the rim black.

 

well i just finished sand blasting all the crap off. let me tell ya hell of a lot faster than sanding. and its the stock silverado rims. the 5 spoke style. its going all black and i may do something with the covers. i forgot to take pics of the rims before blasting. im takin them to class and finishing them and painting.

 

Sandblasting is much faster, but theres a chance of pitting with cast metals.

 

I guess I'll jump in on this, I took the spare off of my 92 the other day and found that... well its the first time it had ever been off and the first time the jack had ever been out of the container. Anyways,

The spare rim looks like absolute *&^%! It has been under the truck for 140,000 miles and it has accumulated quite a bit of crud during that time. I don't want to spend a lot of money on this, but I want to just get all the dirt and rust off, then repaint it. What is the best way to remove all that rust. i started out with a peice of sandpaper, and to say the least that was pretty slow, so I'm thinking about taking out the die grinder. I would sandblast, but a blaster is not readily availible to me and I really don't want to take off the tire

 

If the tire is 16 years old you should replace it right away. Honestly, I would buy some Easy-Off oven cleaner and soak it.

 

I figured you'd say something like that, but there is nothing wrong with it... it is still full of air and holds it perfectly. No weather cracks or anything. I'll consult my Grandpa who is a retired GM mechanic too

 

I just don't trust old tires.
I changed my spare on the Blazer from a tire manufactured in 1999 to a tire manufactured in 2006...

 

EvansBlue is right, don't trust that old tire. It could blowout at highway speed. Tires aren't designed to last more than 5 years. I usually consider replacing my spare when I get new tires. When I got new tires this year I replaced the spare, my reasoning being it would be at the end of it's functional life, and I didn't want to trust it for another four years.

Sandblast first, then paint the rims, THEN replace the tire with a new one. It'll save you a fortune in masking tape. Trust me, if you can get a sandblaster, it's the way to go.(Easyoff also works.)

EvansBlue, those rims you painted came out looking nice. I was referring to the rims with the silver/chrome marking at the outside; in 18-24" street rims it looks OK, but if you go for the standard 15 or 16" rims, to keep your high sidewall tires, IMO all black looks more striking.