O.K. This is the last time for this year unless I lay it down for some reason. I wasn't as happy with the first two paint jobs (as cheap as possible), so I decided to just bite the bullet and do it as right as I could.

I started by stripping everything down. Quality auto body stripper does fine on the side fairings, but it'll eat up the front fairing. After that fiasco, I had to basically rebuild the front fairing. It was melted in a number of places. At first I wasn't sure if I could save it, but it turned out o.k.







I stripped it down, because I didn't want to take a chance with the paints not liking each other. I went with the Crossfire paint system from Napa. While it is cheap, it is much better than what I was going from. After using it, I'll say it laid down very well. I ended up with zero runs with the base coat. But, before I could paint, I had to prime everything and do whatever body work needed to be done.

This is actually my brother laying down the primer - I wanted to let him experience it, so I chose the least volatile step.



I ended up going back to white. This time I picked BMW Alpine White and I like it a lot. This is the tank after three coats of base and four coats of clear. This was all done over the past few days.



I'll assemble the bike tomorrow or Thursday. The clear is supposed to dry overnight. It'll have 24 hours before I touch it. I'm extremely happy with the product. It is much deeper than the other two jobs I attempted.

 

ooh that looks nice, are you going with all white or what other colors are you planning to combine?

 

Im going to be painting my bike over the next couple weeks... what gun were you using, and what PSI was the NAPA paint being sprayed at?

Im going to be using paint from house of kolor, they may have a different setup, im just curios.

 

My initial paint job earlier in the winter was white with black from a rattle can. I figured I'd only be out my time and about $40 if I didn't like it. I liked it, but it didn't have much depth to it, lacked the shine I wanted, and didn't have enough protection from chips. (I was scratching it by just moving it around the garage.)

Not one to give up so easy, I tried the True Blue color I just left. It looked really good, but I didn't like how I finished the body work, so again it came off. I was also a little concerned with visibility. In the end, I decided to go back to the White and Black scheme. This time, I'm using better paint and trying to do it right.

In essence, all of the fairings are white. The gas cap, wheels, and frame are all satin black. The wind screen is tinted dark. I'll have it all together tomorrow and hope to take it for a ride. I'm going to change the oil and plugs first.

The gun is a cheap HVLP model that I'm spraying at 40 psi at the gun (about 35 with the trigger pressed). I sprayed the clear at a little less psi. The clear called for 10-12 psi, but it wasn't laying very well, so I increased the air until I got what I wanted. I used a 1.4 tip. I'll let the paint cure for a week or two and then I'll go back and color sand it.

 

Yeah, i'm doing a white job as well, but want to do pearl with a blue interference. My frame will likely stay stock metal until i stripe the bike down and powdercoat it.

 

in for pics

 

I put it back together and went to fire it up only to have nothing but turning over by backfires. I tore it all apart to check the wires and stuff. Long story short, the plugs were fouled. I replaced them and she fired right up. I put her back together and took it on a shakedown run for a couple of hours. She ran fine. I'm fairly confident I have different sprockets on it too. The speedo is definitely off by a bit. Here's the pics. I'll take a picture of the undertail I made later.

 

that looks awesome man. good job