Wheel Salvaging

Seeing as we had the day off on Friday, I thought I'd get around to doing a few things I had been meaning to do for a while. One of those things was salvaging some used wheels I had in my tire box. I had several matching pairs of worn out Schumacher tires that were no good on the track any more. Using some old lexan scissors, I cut the rubber off of the rims, leaving only pieces of the tire's bead glued to the wheel. I even managed to salvage a few sets of inserts that were in good shape.

The easiest way to remove the rest of the rubber from the wheels is to buy yourself a seal-able container and a bottle of acetone. I bought the Acetone from Rona, and the container from a dollar store. First thing you want to do is make sure the acetone you bought doesn't melt your container. The first time you do this, you may want to do it outside, so if it melts the container, it doesn't wreck your wife's/mom's kitchen table. If the container hasn't melted, pour in some more acetone. You only need enough in there to partially cover the rubber on one side of the wheel, in this case, only a few mm's. Drop in the wheels, put the lid on and let them sit for a few hours. The rubber literally falls right off the wheels. In some cases, I didn't even have to peel off the rubber, it was already floating in the acetone. Flip the wheels over, and do the same for the other side.

Now all that's left is to clean them up with some soap and water, and you've got yourself some good-as-new wheels!

CAUTION: Be aware that some wheels may not like this process... Some wheels have been known to melt when exposed to Acetone. Nylon wheels should be safe, but other 'cheaper' plastics may not fare so well. It's safest to test one wheel, before you throw all of them into the acetone.

[/Tim Sanderson]