Yeah, i dont do body work at all, and by no means am i saying JB weld is the right way tk do it, but ive done it before on multiple wheels, holds up very well over the years! I always put a little extra, let it cure for a week ish (dont need to for that long, just whats convenient for me) and then i sand it down to match the wheel. I always sand and clean the rash area first and then decontaminate if with IPA before applyingg jb weld. These will be my main wheels for now to get rid of the hideous ones on it now, and then when im financially able to, i will buy some nice aftermarket wheels. Like the work wheels but not sure yet, but i got time to look! :) I really do like the forgestar f14's though

I've heard of people using JB for wheels, I just didnt think of it being easy to sand (thinking larger surface area). It's sort of a strange compound, lol. It sands down okay? I still need to refinish my OEM wheels, they too were abused (previous owners, lots of rash as well as coating flaking).. If I dont replace em, I want to do them more gunmetal, a bit darker than stock. Curious to see how yours turn out. Post progress pics.

it does take a bit of work to sand down, and it is rather strange but i gotta say, its a tough compound and holds up well in the NE abuse!! one wheel i did back in 12 had a very large gauge, and i used about 1/3 of the tube and filled it. Holding up well to this day! Does the wheel have OEM strength still? most likely not, but it does the job for a DD and nothing too extreme

OEM Wheel Refurbishing
 

Just got the wheels in today, Came with tires and so far im pleased with spending the $440. The one wheel that is in rough condition is rather beat up but can still be addressed. Over the holiday weekend i plan on cleaning up all the debris on the wheels. Seems like it it heavily coated in brake dust, and just general storage dust. First i began with taking the center caps out and washing them up. Cleaned up nicely. Can't wait for the wheels to be finished!! The tires they came on were alright. Two are useable, the other two and are the wear indicators. will hang onto them for emergency etc. I will be mounting my existing tires on the OEM wheels.

Center Caps Before:
Attachment 217416

Center Caps After:
Attachment 217417

All the Wheels upon arrival: (First Wheel is the worst condition)
Attachment 217418

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Not bad at all. I think mine are worse, lol. I really need to get onto refinishing them, but they are the only wheels for my car so I've been putting it off so my car isn't "down" for a few days.

This may be a silly question.. what do people do with the wheel weights when refinishing?? I mean in your case you could peel them off as they'll need re-balancing anyways when you put on your other tires, but in mine, my tires are already mounted. What the heck am I supposed to do with the weights? If I peel them off they'd need rebalancing, If I leave them at some point it would show when new tires were balanced.. etc..

Yeah thankfully they can be off the car, and i can still drive her :)
Honestly, i always peel em off because depending on what needs to be done, it could throw off the weight ever so slightly and may need to be rebalanced. I dont really get them balanced on an interval bc on my GTI i have summer and winter wheels and never put more than like 10k on each. Plus just my GTI new tires for the first time in 2015. I always rotate every 5k, and check pressure every so often. I get my wheels balanced at my highschool because they have a auto tech program with a highspeed wheel balancer and it costs likes $25 for all 4. Idk if i want them to mount my wheels or anything else etc lol. Ill probably just bring them the wheels when i need em balanced honestly hahaha.

Wheel 3 Update
 

Third wheel, very good condition i'd say, Good deal of brake dust on flip side of the spokes but i will focus on those later, This wheel and the last one I have left are the ones that look the dirtiest. This wheel has no major scars/gouges etc. If weather permits, i will breakout the Iron X and focus on the lug areas, and behind the spokes. So far, so good!

Before Cleaning:
Attachment 217411

After Cleaning(Quick 5 Min. Wheel Cleaner & Rag):
Attachment 217412

Look Into 2017 Projects
 

Some of my 2017 Plans. Will definitely be doing over the brake system, the rest is all up in the air depending on what job i get upon graduation and student loans etc... The brake P/N's are all OEM parts for Mazda and for the Larger Sport brakes if anyone needs them! :Peace:

2017 Plans:
Attachment 217404

Walk Around the Car
 

So I noticed that there weren't really a lot of pictures of the car as it sits, never really cared to take pictures because it's in rather rough aesthetic condition but never the less here is how she sits.
Few Concerns:
-Car was bought plasti-dipped, no I didn't buy it because of this, just needed a car at that time.
-Will be tearing off all plastic-dip come spring and road salt is cleaned up, might as well protect the paint while I can.
-I Do have OEM wheels now, just have to plasti-dip them once the tires from the current wheels are swapped over. (Current tires are new, even tread even though they're cheap tires & I can't afford Powder Coating :yelrotflm)
-Recently removed the plasti-dip off the rotary accents and re=installed them on the car

Attachment 217383

The Borla tips were Cleaned up 800 miles ago... :sweatdrop

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In the latest Fill-Up: 12/30/16.. I Achieved a whopping 12.XX MPG :yelrotflm
This is due to 100% city driving and allowing the car to warm up in the 10F days! I really do need to take her on a road trip ASAP!!

Honestly, other than where its peeling the dip looks fine. Is the body/paint in good shape do you think? Is the dip hiding anything?

Dip was hiding a fender blemish. In 2014-2015 winter, the car was 100% snowed in and i hit the fender with a shovel, i physically damaged it, and it peeled a bit, and thats when i noticed, it looked like it was a rattle can paint, so i peeled off the fender to see what was up, looks like someone tried to sand it down, and bare aluminum is showing now. So i went to each body panel and made a small knick to see if the panel was factory VR. All panels seem to check out, no physical damage and body lines are flush (checked before i bought it) so there doesnt seem to be any other damage. We wont truely know till the dip is off though!

Edit: Also, notice where the gas is.... Yeah some gas spilt! Whoops! Another reason im thinking of going to an Autoflex Coating!

Warm out today, decided to clean up the exhaust tips and then look into the major misalignment of the tips! About 900 miles ago, i cleaned them up, but these things got beyond filthy, but they do polish up REALLY nice! Only if they lined up! :yelrotflm

After looking at the bottom, disconnected the tip and removed it.... turns out the section coming off the muffler itself is severely bent... thanks borla! Im leaning towards heat deformation because there are no scratches gouges or any damage around it that may have caused it to bend, So overall, unless i take the muffler off, its staying all F***** up.

Tips:
Attachment 217377

THEN i decided to show the damaged fender... :scared: poor thing. It really isn't THAT but my OCD makes me feel like car is severely damaged lol. Will maybe take care of this come spring, by that I mean try to take it off, strip it and repaint. But two things... Don't think its worth that cost rather than finding a VR one already... Also, paint will most likely not match the rest of the body.. Was honestly thinking just get the auto flex coating over it.... :sweatdrop

Attachment 217378

Attachment 217379

I bet if you bring it to an exhaust shop they could straighten it out for you, for little money. Would be worth it im sure. Do you have a rear picture that shows it?

Yeah, check the top pic of my last post! Notice the alignment of the passenger side tip!

Hard to tell, lol.

Ill take better picture when its sunny out lol, i realized i don't have the ones i was thinking of posted here :dunno:

Haven't driven her in a while, been too cold and messy roads! :/ My GTI stays dirty so the 8 can stay clean ;)

After taking this, i HAD to wash it even if is 24F outside, just wayyyyy too much salt

Attachment 217305

Don't Judge the mutant color scheme lol, leaving the dip on until snow goes bye bye!
Attachment 217306

Haven't done much, just finished my undergraduate studies! Peeled off the dip off the hood and had the new wheels mounted and balanced with the good tires! Fun starts hopefully this summer

While i was under the hood checking things out, Found out my AC belt has vanished, the vibrations i was having was from the AC belt because THE AC COMPRESSOR WAS NEVER FULLY BOLTED UP SMH.... This engine builder is complete garbage, when it's nice up I'm just going to show up to his shop, this type of work is what you'd expect a high school shop to do.... Just complete garbage work all around... Poor car :(

Possible it just snapped and fell off? You are having other issues related to the build?

Hope the shop stands behind its work

Could be but since i got the car back, i always had intermittent vibrations that i could never pin-point and now that i realize the compressor is lose, that would explain the vibration at varying RPM's and once the belt snapped, the vibrations never came back. Im pretty sure it was also the reason my steering wheel locked one time too... Maybe he should have used loc-tite? :Wconfused

Well our cars have electronic steering, no belt driven pump, so I'm not sure how that could be related.

Others have reported when the bolt is not tightened down properly, It will back out and linger around down there and can actually get stuck whilst turning etc, and the bolts position could prevent any motion of the rack. Basically, really rare that it happens but it did happen back in october and though nothing of it, just the EPS system being "Finicky" but it must have been the bolt. Now that the Compressor is just hanging around down there i can sometimes feel it in the steering wheel when it bumps the rack.

What bolt are you referring to?

I thought you meant the belt popping off was the issue (hence my comment about belt driven pump). I see what you are saying now.