treemuncher
Senior Member
I'm changing tire sizes on the flatbed equipment hauling truck that I built. See later pages of https://www.heavyequipmentforums.com/threads/converting-flatbed-to-dozer-ramp-bed.45182/ for more on that project. While the wheels were off and the tires off of the wheels, it was the ideal time to paint them up and make it look better. I recently tried Napa's Rust Proof M/D paint on some of my track frames - very tough paint - so I thought it would be ideal for the wheels as they were somewhat rusty and will be on occasional gravel roads. I picked up some of the gloss white for the rims.
I did a search online and found http://www.minimizer.com/product/tire-mask/ which looks like a great product for a fleet with existing tires on the wheels, but not for what I am doing. This is great to sharpen up the paint on rims and hubs with spray cans, but not for this urethane job that I wanted to do.
In order to make life easier and spray paint more uniformly, I knew I needed a lazy suzan that could handle the weight of the semi wheels. My welding table was the ideal mount and already within the fume hood. I knew that I had saved an old throw-out bearing from a clutch change out years ago. A little time on the lathe making some bushings to bolt the bearing to the table and make a stand-off did the trick. Just a small 2.5" used bushing with a plywood board on top balanced the wheels just fine with the shallow side down. When flipped, I added a length of 3" pipe with a custom cut wood piece to support the wheel from the deep side. Spin slowly by hand while spraying - works great and will come in handy for some of my welding jobs as well. I did production runs and did the deep side of all 8 wheels at one time, let dry, did the shallow side, let dry and then a second coat on the deep side. This was done with one quart of paint and a few ounces of thinner at an 8:1 or less ratio for the HVLP spray gun.
New tires go on tomorrow.
I did a search online and found http://www.minimizer.com/product/tire-mask/ which looks like a great product for a fleet with existing tires on the wheels, but not for what I am doing. This is great to sharpen up the paint on rims and hubs with spray cans, but not for this urethane job that I wanted to do.
In order to make life easier and spray paint more uniformly, I knew I needed a lazy suzan that could handle the weight of the semi wheels. My welding table was the ideal mount and already within the fume hood. I knew that I had saved an old throw-out bearing from a clutch change out years ago. A little time on the lathe making some bushings to bolt the bearing to the table and make a stand-off did the trick. Just a small 2.5" used bushing with a plywood board on top balanced the wheels just fine with the shallow side down. When flipped, I added a length of 3" pipe with a custom cut wood piece to support the wheel from the deep side. Spin slowly by hand while spraying - works great and will come in handy for some of my welding jobs as well. I did production runs and did the deep side of all 8 wheels at one time, let dry, did the shallow side, let dry and then a second coat on the deep side. This was done with one quart of paint and a few ounces of thinner at an 8:1 or less ratio for the HVLP spray gun.
New tires go on tomorrow.