This weeks video is a fun little project that i mentioned a couple of weeks ago.It is the restoration of this old neglected Kawasaki rim and then turning it into an awesome backlit clock for my friends workshop. He got the idea after seeing my original wheel restoration hung on my wall, you can check out the video here - • Severely Neglected Whe...
As usual the first job is to check the item over to make sure there arent any faults that would render the wheel useless down the line. It all checked out fine so onwards the project shall go.
The first job i got out of the way was to remove the brake discs as these can be a total nightmare if someone has over tightened the bolts in the past or has used way too much thread lock but these ones came loose relatively easily which surprised me with the wheel laying in the mud for so long. once the brake discs were off and put to one side for safe keeping i made my way over to the tyre machine to remove the tyre. The corrosion on the alloy rim made the bead quite hard to brake but the machine managed it.
Once the tyre was removed the wheel rim was give a thorough washing with a citrus based all purpose cleaner to dissolve all the grime the had accumulated over the years. Once clean it was very apparent that this rim was in terrible shape!
After washing it was into the blasting cabinet to remove all corrosion and any old paint that was still on the wheel. Once blasted i mounted the wheel on my truing stand to make the job of sanding the polished lips and spokes back to an acceptable level a bit easier. Once sanded using progressively finer grades of sand paper it was time to break out the wool polishing pads and the metal polishing compounds and pastes.
After lots of polishing i got to the stage where i was happy enough with the finish as it was only destined to be wall art now not a show piece on a bike so a mirror finish would have been overkill.
Once i had masked up the polished edges it was onto the standard paint procedure, etch,prime then paint. The colour is just standard Kawasaki green nothing fancy or exotic on this one. This was then left to cure while i started work on the brake discs.
The discs and bolts were left overnight in a bath of Bilt Hamber DEOX C and as you can see from the video the results are stunning. Only a light polishing was required to bring them back to a lovely shine.
At this stage i just done the reverse of the disassembly except for when it came to fitting the last brake disc as i had to fit the clock mechanism and cover plate before the disc as the disc is what holds the mechanism on. Once all bolted up i pushed on the clock handles and flipped the wheel over and prepared it to accept the led's.
Fitting the lighting wasn't hard at all it was just a case of choosing strategic locations for all the components so that they cant be seen from the front of the wheel.
I hope you enjoyed this little project as much as i did. See you all soon in the next video.
If you like what you see and have any ideas for the channel or would even like to donate something to restore to the channel please get in touch. :)
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