Thread: Silicone spray on tyres

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We took the '47 into the local garage the other day to get a few minor things done, (a warrant of fitness mainly, so that we're legal for the up-coming NSRA Nationals,) and as part of the 'service' they put a silicone spray on my tyres.
"Makes them look shiny and smart," they told me.
Well it might if your tyres are all black, but it has made our white-walls look yellow! Yuk!
Does any-one have any ideas as to how to get this stuff off? I thought of trying methylated spirits, but I'm not too sure as to what that would do to the tyre itself.
Any ideas? Please?
johnboy

Johnboy,
You could try one of those foam tire cleaners (I use Armorall tire cleaner) but it may not be available in the US.

If this fails use some cellulose thinners on a cloth and wipe only the white walls because you can smudge the white onto the black, if this does happen use another piece of cloth and carefully white the white smudge off the black.

Johnboy,
I've only just seen where you're from, sorry I assumed you were in America.
Stupid 'old' pom'

DO NOT USE Wesleys bleach white! the bleach will dry out the rubber surface causing it to dry rot and crack prematurely, especialy on the white surface. Coker Tire makes a great white wall cleaner that they sell, its not as cheap as wesleys, but it doesnt dry out and attack the rubber like wesleys. It works on the whole tire, not just the whitewall, and it keeps my tires looking fresh and new, but not that shiney "fake" look that armorall gives you. www.coker.com should help you out.

&&& if all else fails i have heard folks using like 1000 & up grit sandpaper w/water on whitewalls. they talked about this on HAMB & many have used this method.....joe

Use the tire cleaner foam and a tire brush. A tire brush is a brass bristled brush sort of looks like a barbeque grill brush with short bristles. I use shine spray on my wide whites on my 50 Packard but block off the white wall with a piece of cardboard so just the black get sprayed.

SOS pads work wonders also. I used these for years on whitewalls and raised white letters. Cheap too...

Back before the days of the spray on tire shine, we used brake fluid. I don't know what it does to the color of the white walls though.
I still use it to clean off the primer overspray on my tires.

Awesome! Thanks heaps for the input guys, first off, I think I'll run with TooMany2count and astroracer's ideas, but only because I've already got some ulta-fine steel wool and wet/dry paper in the shed, which means I won't have to spend any money!
Will re-post as to how I got on.
Once again, thanks a lot.
johnboy

Little safety thing here. It is not recommended to spray any silicone based liquid or any tire shine stuff directly on the tire if you can see the disc brake rotor. If you get the substance on the rotor chances are the brakes may not work too well. Just food for thought.

That worked extremely well. I started with the steel wool, because it's finer than the 1200 grit paper I've got, and that's all I had to use, apart from one or two stubborn spots that I took to with the paper. Easy as!
Isn't it silly how it's the little things that tend to get you wound up the most?
I was actually quite spewing over that. Now, well I couldn't be happier if I was twins!
Thanks again people!
johnboy

If you do any painting in your shop do not allow silicons in the shop......they can really mess up a paint job.

Use a foam. Don

I have used bleach white on my Indian's whitewalls with no problems. 'Course, the rear wears out in about 4-6 thousand miles, and the front in 12-18... so maybe not long enough to be a problem.

in the army we used to put brake fluid on the tires, but I always suspected it was bad for them. Again.. they didn't last long enough to be a real time issue.