Recently asked if some one had re-conditioned his hub caps, to no avail.



As I really wanted to stay with the original Jaguar ones, opposed to the cheap(er) later versions or the Chinese knock-offs, decided to go ahead with my faded (pink in stead of red) caps.

Took them carefully apart with the help of some heat from a hair blower, then cleaned the remains of the double sided tape and old paint.
Sealed the chrome leaper (to protect any tiny holes in the chrome becoming red spots), then painted the inside with 3 layers of red.
Finished with installing them back in the housing with some thin, 3M double sided tape.













By the way, as the cover is transparent, you can think about other backgrounds then just one plain color ...



Now just waiting for my rims to be finished after reconditioning and fitted with some new rubber.

 

Nice. I'm going to try this as soon i manage to get my wheels off the car

How did you get the red paint off without scratching the plastic?

 

Amazing! Slightly misleading title, as these are centre caps, not hub caps, but great work nonetheless!

Maybe this could be an option for myself, rather than spending $100+ on 4 new red centre caps, I could just buy one replacement (as one is missing) and paint them instead

 

Title changed!

OP -What a great job

Thanks for sharing

 

Wet sandpaper, laying on a flat surface, just circle the caps around on it.
It comes off quite easily, then use super-fine to prep before painting.

Most important is the to seal the chrome though, hold it against a strong light to see any damage which you will need to tough-up.
As you can see, I had one ''try-out'' cap, which was missing the chrome on one ear, and used super shiny flaked chrome nail polish to repair.
Invisible repair!

 

Eric,

A very ingenious solution to a common problem, and since the same center / centre caps were used on many models, XJ40, XJ81, X300, X305, X306, X308 and XK8, and they will fit X350, X358 and probably others, your Top Tip is going to be useful to a lot of owners for years to come.

Thanks for the great idea and for taking the time to photograph and post your work!

BTW, was your plastic in good shape or did you polish it with something like 3M Plastic Polish?

Cheers,

Don

 

The plastic of the caps was in very reasonable state, but I indeed polished the outside after all painting was done.

I also cleaned and polished the chrome rings.
The picture still shows some pitting in the chrome, but this is hardly visible in real.
It is very hard to determine how far you can go before ending up with the plastic color ....

 

Eric,

Thanks again for your work. I have added a link to your initial post to the 'HOW TO' quick links of the XJ40 through X350 forums.

Cheers,

Don

 

Glad to contribute just a little, as compensation for everything I learned and was helped with during the last year.

 

Thank you so much for this awesome tip! I totally thought I'd have to shell out $150 for new ones, but now they're painted black just like how I wanted! No more pink center caps for this cat.