Reviving Old Paint with Wheel Polish

Making badly oxidized finishes look their best

The car-care industry offers products that are formulated for almost every conceivable cleaning/polishing scenario: Modern waxes contain chemicals that are tailored to the specific paint styles (base/clearcoat, for example), and other compounds are designed for varying automotive surfaces, such as plastics and leather.

Happy Accident

Hardcore auto buffs are always on the lookout for ways to score extra points at car shows or tricks for making their for-sale vehicles look their best. These people typically spend hours experimenting with whatever parts or products are sitting around their garages. A classic example is silicone sprays (such as WD-40), which have proven themselves the "secret weapon" for finding vacuum leaks, removing road tar and solving countless other problems.

Another such "secret" is using aluminum wheel polish to make old paint—oxidized and/or cracking finishes that really should be repainted—look as good as it can under the circumstances. This makes sense: Wheel polish is gritty enough to cut through crud but mild enough to not scratch aluminum and chrome.

We decided to test an aluminum/mag polish on a mid-'80s GM car, a vintage notorious for clearcoats with a propensity to peel and fade. This particular car has never been garaged and hasn't been treated to regular washings and waxings in recent years. We don't recommend this procedure for newer finishes because the car-care industry offers plenty of quality products for cleaning and maintaining paint. However, if you're trying to make a really-needs-to-be-repainted car look its best to trade in or sell and the normal paint-care products don't quite penetrate deep enough to remove thick oxidation or imbedded grime, aluminum wheel-polish "waxing" is worth considering.