This is a very early ‘98 - has a bunch of info with the car - window sticker, brochures, build sheets, etc. my question is the wheels are the alum spoke (see pic) but they’re not polished - they’re painted silver metallic - is this a correct wheel?

 

I think that the silver painted wheel was not available until 2000. Don't quote me on that, though.

 

This is the stock wheel on a 98. The wheel you are showing is 2000 and newer.

 

The window sticker shows alum spoke wheels as an option - not the stock “wagon” wheels.

 

The only other wheel was a five spoke magnesium wheel. It was an expensive option. That wheel that you have shown is not a 98 style wheel. That Stock wheel was not called a wagon wheel by GM. It was a five spoke aluminum wheel.

 

the wagon wheels are aluminum, and they have 5 spokes...

 

Yep it looks like I am wrong - sure glad I have these wheels instead of the others.

 

Yeah, I like the silver painted wheels, though you hardly ever see them anymore.

 

I bought a set of these that the seller said they came off of a 2002 car, they were painted shiny silver with polished areas. From a distance they were gorgeous, I hoped to restore them to original condition, but the powder coating shop said he'd be a millionaire if that was possible, everyone wanted that. I had him do them matte black with a shiny clear top coat. I was disappointed that I had to settle,but after getting on the car I like the look. This picture is about 3 weeks old.


This was the appearance as delivered from the factory. Look nice, but large areas of flaking paint just didn't do it for me. The wheels had been in storage for so long the owner forgot he had them, about 15 years. The tires had lots of tread left, but I don't trust tires older than 5 years.


I should have taken these pictures of the back side before the powder coating, sorry, I forgot. You can see that they are GM wheels.


This is after the powder coating. Total cost after the purchase, $200 for the wheels, $400 to powder coat, and $600 installed and balanced for new tires. So far, they haven't cracked, which my old wagon wheels did when new tires were installed, even a replacement wheel cracked. and one front wheel got bent somehow, but didn't cause any vibrations. The tire shop found the bent wheel when they spun them by hand on the lift.

This was taken last August, the hub caps were painted silver, one of them looked like it had been attacked with an ice pick, dozens of sharp pointed craters. I did some body work on it, using epoxy for plastics and repainted them matte black polyurethane from Home depot, then several coats of shiny clear 2 part aerosol from the online supplier I get my Torch red from. After getting them on without a scratch, I fumble fingered the air pressure gauge and nicked one wheel spoke. A dab of black paint, some fine sanding to level the spot repair and a final clear spot paint got them in usable condition, not perfect, but what used part is?

I had the mistaken impression that powder coat was a hard shell finish, it isn't. They have been on the car since last August, still look new. In the Florida sun, that's more than you can expect.

Cleaning the drums inside is much easier with these wheels, to clean the wagon wheels I had to put the car on jack stands and do the cleaning underneath using a creeper, not fun, considering how often they need cleaning.

 

The wheels on your car were not available until model year 2000 and the base wheel was painted silver. The optional wheel of that style was a high polished finish with clear coat on it.

 

Mine had shiny silver painted areas with highly polished metal strips going around the rims. Where the silver flaked off you could see unpolished aluminum or magnesium under the paint, where the paint flaked over the polished strips the metal under the clear coat was highly polished. I wished I could keep them that way. I am still looking for a set, maybe one day. I was wondering how a powder coat shop could mask the wheel to get that effect, turns out, you can't out side of the factory that made them. I looked at the shiny silver samples he had, looked more like raw aluminum paint with a rough surface for the base. I wanted the best shine possible, black was it. He wasn't sure if he could make it that shiny, I was the first to want shiny black, all his other black coatings were matte.

 

Those are from a late model C5 as they are a Wider thin spoke