Cleaning up rusty wheels

[Frankencelery]

I've been putting tubes in all my ATC's for a while now, but this seems to be an imperfect solution. Eventually the tube ends up sliding around inside the rim and cutting the valve stem. I thought I solved this with steel stems that have a threaded nut on them, but then it just ripped the rubber around the stem! My second set of tubes on my SX are now twisted. I bought a brand new set of new rims for my SX, which will hopefully solve that problem. They should be in sometime next month.

But I digress. What I wanted to ask about was my ATC70. I used my handy-dandy manual tire machine from Harbor Freight to break the beads, then I split the rims. The bead area is so rusty and pitted that I can't believe it ever sealed. Can these be cleaned up? I would think sanding would take a year. Can you use some kind of grinder? What do you guys do?

I had this problem on my 200s, and i just ran a bead of black silicone around the bead and then aired up the tire. I imagine I'll never get that one apart. I don't really want to do that again.

[300rman]

use a wire brush. works great, and wont take forever.

[pickleweasel_00]

wire brush... or wire wheel

[Frankencelery]

Yeah, I got out there and did that this morning, and although I cleaned up the rust, the pitting is pretty bad. Obviously now I need to repaint the rim, but is there something to use to fill in the gaps so the bead will seal? Seems to me that I saw the tire guys use some kind of goop to seal the bead.

[hondahaulic]

that green tire slime should work great to seal the bead, but it sometimes makes the rim spin in the tire quite a bit. I'm not sure, but I would think it would work fine on a 70.

[pickleweasel_00]

i think you can get actual bead sealer. I've seen it before in a can, might check with you local parts store and see if they can fix you up or call a tire shop and see what they use

[3Razors]

Sometimes if the wheel is pretty beat its usually just cheaper to buy a new wheel. When you figure your time and money with sanding, banging out dents, and painting. $20 for a new 8 inch steel wheel doesnt sound so bad.

[Frankencelery]

I wire brushed this one and repainted, and it looks pretty good. Now I've done it....I'm going to have to do the other two. Or, like you said, buy some new ones. Where can I get these rims for $20?

[3Razors]

Rockymountainatv.com has them for $19

[Frankencelery]

Can you get me a link for those? When I browse Rocky Mountain's website, they make me choose a specific machine before I can look at wheels, and the ATC70 isn't one of the choices. They DO have an 8" ITP steel wheel for $19, but it's a 4-hole.