Axial Honcho wheel - less modern makeover

[Headquake]

Hello, i took some pics while playing around in the shop tonight.
I thought i'd document a pretty easy makeover technique for rims that you may not like the look of, but have lots of.
Like those plastic Axial Honcho rims.

I like the soft ripsaw tires, they work good, look pretty good, and are kinda nice and skinny, but i always thought the rims looked too modern on any of my old trucks, so i never used them. I like to recycle old parts and make them into new things, i find it quite fun. I also like the look of a nice solid old looking rim like the cheap Tamiya Hummers.

Here's a pretty easy way to give the Axials a similar look. It works with other plastic rims you may hate too. Ha.



First, get a piece of thin cardstock or thick paper and lay it over the rim. Press down around the edge till you get a good impression of the rims edge on the paper. Try not to deform the paper to much while pushing.




Cut the circle out, then make a straight cut from the edge to the center.




Make sure it fits nice into the rim with the cut overlapped to make the circle into a subtle cone shape that lays flush on the rims face. Run a pencil up the cut line to see what you'll have to trim off to have it not overlap anymore. Push in on the paper to indent the bolts of the rim into it as well to see where to cut out the middle.




Cut out the middle section a little bigger than where the bolt indentations show, and trim the overlap bit off.




Make sure it fits nice and flush in the rim after. The middle should hang over the center of the rim just slightly. Its easier to trim with a blade after its glued on.




Transfer the cardstock template to thin styrene.




Cut it out (i found scissors the easiest way to do this), sand the edges smooth and make sure it fits in the rim nice. It may take a few small adjustments and trims to get it perfect. Once happy with the fit, glue it in with thick CA glue or your other favourite type that you know will hold it on best. Then use a blade to trim the inside edge flush with the inside of the rim shape.




Now, do that three more times, glue them all in, and putty the seam a little if need be. Even if the crack is tight, the styrene may dent in a little at the crack. Puttying will make it alot less noticable.




You can stop at this step if you like the look. Just sand the putty smooth and paint.

I wanted to give these a little more shape with another raised part, so i decided how big i wanted the shape then traced it out on thin styrene using little paint bottles as templates.




Carefully cut the piece out and lay it in place on the sanded rim surface. Since the face of the rim is cone-ish, the new piece won't sit flat unless it is too. So push it down flat and mark how much the ends overlap.




Trim off that little overlap piece then glue the new bit onto the rim face. Once dry, sand all the edges smooth.




Then finish the other three rims the same way and paint them up however you want. I went with a brush painted old look with some silver and flat black.





So, you may still like the original look of the Axial rims better, but they're alot more suited to my old trucks now and i will actually use them. Ha. Like i said before, its an easy way to makeover an old rim and it only took a couple hours.

Hope that was a handy idea for someone in the future.

[imthatguy]

Sharp looking mod there Rick!

[szymon1]

they look more classic and realistic, great job as usual

[UNGLEWD]

This would almost make a base for any style too, nice Rick.

[generis]

What a great idea!

[Ikaros]

Very neat idea. It bothered me that I nearly ruined my ripsaw's gluing them to the evans wheels. This solutions makes them useable again!

[crawl330h]

If they had 8 lugs instead of 6 they would look like the rims on my truck

[Heavy Chevy]

Great idea! Way to recycle! Efficient, cost effective and awesome!

[Honger]

Wow! So simple and yet so perfect. Thanks for sharing this idea.