Hello guys.

I've been thinking of restoring and repainting my steel rims.
However I've become unsure if their too rusty to repair!

My thought was to get a steelwire attachment for a cordless drill to get the rust off. However do anyone with a bit more experience within this know if there's too much rust?

I've attached some images of the rims.

Thanks in advance

Not so much a repair as restoration.

You could use a corded plug-in tool or hand wire bushes or combination of both or all three with cordless. Until you give it a good brushing it's hard to tell but in the photo on screen to me (not that I really know that much) it looks like that wheel(s?) might have potential.

You might want to rust proof before painting.

I can't see/read a date on the "winter" mud and snow tyre so whilst it seems to have lots of tread wear left and depending how it has been stored it might (or might not) be passed its best for road use.

Others may have different thoughts to me and will know more.

It looks like you have a 5Jx14 ET35 5/100 57.1 specification steel rim, which was fitted to the Fabia MK1/MK2/MK3, Roomster, and Rapid.

On the Fabia MK1/MK2 a 165/70R14 tyre size was fitted to this rim specification.

On the Fabia MK3, Roomster, and Rapid a 175/70R14 tyre size was fitted to this rim specification.

One aftermarket steel rim in this specification is the Alcar 5210, which is available from mytyres for about £40 including shipping to the UK from Germany. Google "alcar 5210 mytyres" to find this listing...or you could search for steel rims for the Fabia MK1/MK2/MK3, Roomster, or Rapid on their website.

Alcar steel rims are made in Switzerland, so as you would expect are OE quality and are an exact match including appearance to the original Skoda steel rim. However, I've noticed in the past that mytyres will often send out an alternative OE quality steel rim to Alcar. So although mytyres say they will send out an Alcar steel rim, what they actually send out might be different. Perhaps a genuine VAG steel rim or perhaps a German made steel rim, etc. So although not always Alcar usually a good quality alternative...at least from my experience.

Edited 20 March20 Mar by Carlston

On 20/03/2025 at 19:32, Carlston said:

It looks like you have a 5Jx14 ET35 5/100 57.1 specification steel rim, which was fitted to the Fabia MK1/MK2/MK3, Roomster, and Rapid.

On the Fabia MK1/MK2 a 165/70R14 tyre size was fitted to this rim specification.

On the Fabia MK3, Roomster, and Rapid a 175/70R14 tyre size was fitted to this rim specification.

One aftermarket steel rim in this specification is the Alcar 5210, which is available from mytyres for about £40 including shipping to the UK from Germany. Google "alcar 5210 mytyres" to find this listing...or you could search for steel rims for the Fabia MK1/MK2/MK3, Roomster, or Rapid on their website.

Alcar steel rims are made in Switzerland, so as you would expect are OE quality and are an exact match including appearance to the original Skoda steel rim. However, I've noticed in the past that mytyres will often send out an alternative OE quality steel rim to Alcar. So although mytyres say they will send out an Alcar steel rim, what they actually send out might be different. Perhaps a genuine VAG steel rim or perhaps a German made steel rim, etc. So although not always Alcar usually a good quality alternative...at least from my experience.

Is this the Alcar you're talking about?

34 minutes ago, T150 said:

Th

Is this the Alcar you're talking about?

The specification of that steel rim is 6Jx14 ET38 5/100 57.1 which is different from 5Jx14 ET35 5/100 57.1, ie. 1" difference in the rim width and 3mm difference in the offset...plus the appearance is different...which you can see from the photos below.

Alcar 5210 5Jx14 ET35 5/100 57.1 steel rim (6.78kg) (from Fabia MK1/MK2/MK3, Roomster, Rapid)

https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rims/details?vehicleId=180852620338926692&rimCode=ALCAR5210

Alcar 3055 5Jx14 ET38 5/100 57.1 steel rim (6.85kg) (from Fabia MK4)

https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rims/details?vehicleId=1351328927595312228&rimCode=ALCAR3055

Alcar 7250 6Jx14 ET37 5/100 57.1 steel rim (7.23kg) (from Fabia MK2, Roomster)

https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rims/details?vehicleId=183698156431610980&rimCode=ALCAR7250

Alcar 7600 6Jx14 ET38 5/100 57.1 steel rim (7.70kg) (from Golf MK4, Octavia MK1)

https://www.mytyres.co.uk/rims/details?vehicleId=54804057574949988&rimCode=ALCAR7600

Edited 8 April8 Apr by Carlston

I offer a few options:

a) dismount the tires if they are still good, and for the money that new steel wheels cost, get them and you are back on the road in no time. The old wheels have multiple purposes as "stands" or other weight items, before going to the scrap, which you might get some pennies as well.

b) if you want to "restore", as mentioned above, and are concern about their condition, the best course of actions is to dismount the tires, bring the wheels to a good tire center and have them checked for distortion or unbalance, and eventually repair them. Then you go to sandblast them, and have them powdercoat with a proper treatment which will prevent rust and will last much longer.

Obviously this is recommended only if the wheels are valuable enough to justify the hassle and expense.

An alternative to powdercoating is paint, but then you need someone that will paint professionally and with desire, and I would add have him/her put a double layer of lacquer on top, to increase resistance to damaging action.

c) if you have a looooot of time to waste, endulge yourself in hours of destroying your hands, fingers, and equipment in using a wire brush. Make sure you get good, thick gloves, you will need several wire brushes and avoid cheap ones from the bricolage as they literally disintegrate and fly off everywhere. In anycase, make you wear protective glasses, ALWAYS! Keep your eyes safe from harm, they are among the most expensive "items" in our body ...

You are likely to wear and trash out a drill for this purpose, so keep this in mind. If you use a battery powered make breaks if you see battery gets too warm.

After that, provided you manage to remove ALL the rust all around the rims, is time to use a proper ground/epoxy base and then paint. If you do it by brush, depending on your skills if will range from horryfing to acceptable.

I think I was clear in illustrating how useless the entire process is. I have wasted many an hour and many a piece of equipment trying to save things undeserving to be saved. Hope these words are useful to others to avoid wasting time, money, and potentially hurting themselves.

Last but not least, a wheel that has reached this condition denotes years of neglect. To avoid getting to this stage, it would be advisable to have wheels cleaned regularly, especially after the bad season. When in the initial corrosion phase, the simple application of a corrosion converter like Wurth/Fertan and others, can minimize the damaging action of rust, and then even a simple spray/brush application of a product like Hammerite can keep it at bay. When it arrives to this condition, is a much more involving "saving action", and most of the times, hopeless unless radically approached (sand/powder, for example).