A Quick Saturday Morning Project - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners

Our Boxster had been driven in several days of bad weather and desperately needed a bath. When I went out to do it Saturday morning the first thing that caught my eye were the nasty looking rotor hats. They were zinc plated when new, but the plating on the face didn't hold up. I'd been trying to ignore them, but I just couldn't take it anymore. So, I pulled the wheels, scuffed the rust off of the rotor hats, masked them off real good and sprayed them with Eastwood's Silver Cadmium paint. It took me about two hours. I'm much happier now. What do you think?

Nice! Mine probably look the same as your's used to, but they're covered by my wheels. You did get around to washing the car, right? Cool wheels....

I brushed mine black with rustoleum for the same reason, nice job you did. Those are awesome looking wheels, I'll bet they would look cool with those trim caps you can buy for the lugs, maybe black. With the large ovoid openings around the lug it looks like you wouldn't have the removal problem posed by the deep narrow OEM sockets.

Great job! Looks good!

Good job, looks clean! I'll do mine when I change out the new rotors, for now, I'll live with the rust.

are the top hats separate? or are they part of the rotors?

good job man, looks 10x better looks nice, my sister has a black car w black wheels, and hers were like orange from all the corrosion and whatnot, cleaned it up, sprayed with black heat paint, and looks much nicer. i will be doing my pads change soon, so ill probably get around to that as well.

The hats and rotors are all one piece.

very nice, Grizz! 2 hours of your free time well spent

Grizzly, are these the aftermarket zimmerman cross drilled rotors?

Well Randall... They're rotors...and they're crossdrilled, but I can't remember if they're Zimmermans or not. They're from ebay. That's about all I remember.

Looks great, Griz... two comments: 1. You need wheel locks. Someone might try to take those bad boys! 2. That was two hours you could have spent on the Ranchero. Where are the pictures you promised?

Grizzly, I believe they are zimmermans. My mechanic told me not to trust the zinc coating on aftermarket rotors because it would rust after a year... you've just confirmed this. When I must buy them I will spray the hats good before I install them.

1. You are right but I really hate the look of wheel locks. 2. Beyond buying a '71 Torino 500 parts car, I haven't even thought about starting on the Ranchero. As soon as I get a chance I'll take some pictures for you. It's ROUGH. I'm going to get lots of practice welding, that's for sure.

thanks grzzly!

Very nice. Just had a thought- are OEM hats zinc plated? Oddly enough, my wheels caught my attention last weekend-but it was just too COLD. :ah:

the oem hats are zinc plated and tend not to rust. the aftermarket zimmermans don't have paint or zinc plating on the hats. they rust quickly.

i have OEM rotors on the back - the hats are matte black. NO RUST. I recently redid my front rotors and used zimmerman rotors. didn't paint the hats - as the m echanic did the install for me - and they rusted quickly. I am going to be painting my calipers this weekend - and when the wheels are off, I am going to paint the hats. I want to do it with the rotors ON the car - I am too lazy to pull it all off. any suggestions on masking to make sure I do this right? I am also going to probably toss on some spacers too.... H&R which are silver in color. i had thought about just painting the fronts - but odds are it will look weird if the front / rear hats are different in color.... i'll notice it and will buck the heck out of m e... so i will likely repaint all four hats. not sure if I should do them in black - or go with a silver to try and match the spacers. or should I spray the spacers too so they exactly match the hats?? also - should I brush the hats or should I mask and spray? any suggestiosn on what kind of paint to use? i ordered the G2 kit for the calipers - in red - but I figure for my hats I can just hit the local pep boys and get inexpensive high temp paint - and either brush the hats or spray. i don't think it will be a big deal to paint the main front surface, but the part that is immediatley next to the braking surface - any suggestions on how to get a nice clean line there and not have it all messy loooking. if I mask it with blue painters tape - how do I nicely mask it so that it is perfectly"round" like hte shape of the rotor? i havne't pulled the wheel off to try it but it just seems like when I go to do it the painters tape will not easily conform to a nice shape... or will it? i'm open to suggestions. this is gonna be an all day deal, and at least a 6 pack.

"any suggestiosn on what kind of paint to use? i ordered the G2 kit for the calipers - in red - but I figure for my hats I can just hit the local pep boys and get inexpensive high temp paint - and either brush the hats or spray." also you may want to take a look at this link, it has a DIY for painting the calipers using " Dupli-color engine enamel ", the link is to Pedros Garage http://www.pedrosgarage.com/Site%203/Paint%20the%20Calipers.html

[QUOTE=23109VC] if I mask it with blue painters tape - how do I nicely mask it so that it is perfectly"round" like hte shape of the rotor? i havne't pulled the wheel off to try it but it just seems like when I go to do it the painters tape will not easily conform to a nice shape... or will it? Some hobby shops have special masking tape for models that is very flexible and you can make some nice curves with it, comes in widths up to 1/2 in. or maybe 3/4, been a while since I've used it, then the blue stuff on top of that should work fine. later dave