How do you keep you wheels clean? - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners

sasha055 · 08-03-2010, 07:57 AM

Hi,

My rear wheels seems to have a dust problem, after I clean them.. in a day or two black dust of death is back.. it's only on rear wheels.. fronts stay clean for weeks

Last week I (yet again) washed nicely my wheels and applied wheel wax on them.. it's was better.. time to dust doubled from 2 days to 4 days..

Is there any solution to this? except washing the wheels every day, brake dust blocker maybe? what do you do? maybe something is wrong with brakes.. since it happens only in rears

I hate washing the wheels, I have 18" Sport Design wheels and they are a pain to wash with all those spokes and little bolts... and my son is only 3 years old so I cannt outsource the job yet

Any advice is greatly appreciated!
Thanks
Sasha

PS: A little info on the car, I have a 2000 Boxster 2.7L with 70K miles on it. I don't know what brake pads are installed, I bought the car with my eyes closed just because it was soooo shiny and good looking.
I do have to change rotors they are pretty worn out.. both fronts and back
While we are it.. any good cheap cross drilled rotor out there? I saw cheap ones on ebay (150$ for all 4) are they good? I don't track the car.. it's my daily driver

ekam · 08-03-2010, 08:47 AM

If the rear wheel gets much dirtier than the fronts... it's possible that one of the caliper piston is stuck. Either that or you're mixing different pads front and rear.

My fronts gets twice, probably three times as dirty than the rears.

I clean my wheels with P21S wheel cleaner. 5 spokes helps but it still takes me 45mins to an hour to do all 4 wheels.

Topless · 08-03-2010, 08:52 AM

If your rears are sooting up in a few days you have a problem. Lousy pads, oil leak at CV boot, sticky caliper etc. Front wheels usually load up a lot faster than rears because that is where 80% of braking force happens.

For cleaning I just use a fairly stiff brush, car wash soap and finish up with a rag. I polish them once a year or so but I am not a concourse guy.

sasha055 · 08-03-2010, 10:40 AM

Now I'm freaked out

Can it be from rotors? or from a wheel bearing going bad? (my left rear wheel bearing is waiting to be replaced)

Also if it's a stuck piston how do I fix it?

Thanks
Sasha

Topless · 08-03-2010, 10:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sasha055

Now I'm freaked out

Can it be from rotors? or from a wheel bearing going bad? (my left rear wheel bearing is waiting to be replaced)

Also if it's a stuck piston how do I fix it?

Thanks
Sasha

Yep. Bad bearings or rotors could cause it too. If you are hard on the rotors you will get a nasty grinding sound under braking. A sticky caliper can be rebuilt or replaced. Time to get some experienced eyes in there to have a look.

sasha055 · 08-06-2010, 06:22 AM

Hi,

I have another question.

I have a "whoooo whooo" noise coming from my left rear wheel, I thought it's a wheel bearing going bad and bought all the tools and set the time aside to replace it (in 2 weeks)

However, Yesterday after reading more threads on brake dust, I sprayed everything inside the wheel (including calipher) with brake cleaning sollution, waited 2 min and hosed it down.
Suprisingly my bad wheel bearing got better.. noise almost dissapeared, I can hear it only when going 70+mph...

I suppose it's some kind of brake dust build up going on inside the rear wheels..

What should I do next? (before ripping off my bearing?)
Change brake pads? bleed the brakes? anything else?

Thanks
Sasha