Hey guys and girls! I just bought a used 2002 CBR F4i last weekend and I am having a blast. I took a MSF course in 2003 and got my M endorsement, but never bought a bike. I took another MSF course as a refresher 2 weeks ago because everyone at work was buying bikes and I got the itch again. Now that I have one I sure wish I had bought one back in 2003. I feel like I have missed out on so much fun. I have had the bike for 4 days and put almost 200 miles on it. Here is a little background on the bike and some pictures.

The bike only had 377 miles put on it by the first owner. I guess his dad got sick and he was unable to ride. So it sat in his garage. The second owner rode it a little more and racked up about 4800 miles on the bike. He kept the bike in his dads garage. All of his friends decided to get cruisers and sold their sportsbikes so now he is selling his. I found it on craigslist and it is in pretty damn good shape. Runs great. Has fender eliminator and he took off the stock exhaust and put a straight pipe on it. The only problem I have with the bike is the first owner got the tank painted to match the helmet he had. That helmet was passed to the second owner and now to me. I have bought another helmet and I am not much a fan of the paint on the tank. It doesn't look terrible and I can live with it, but I would really like to remove it. If ANYONE has any idea's of how to remove this paint and not damage the clearcoat and original paint PLEASE help me out. I will include some close up pictures of the paint I am talking about.



















As you can see there are no chips or scratches or dings. Its never been dropped or knocked over. She cost me 4300 which is more than I wanted to spend but I think it was worth every penny. I am looking for an opinion to if I should keep the straight pipe on the bike. At first when I heard it I was like ehhh thats got to go. When I got the bike home and rode it around for a bit I have started to like it. It is loud but loud is good right? If they don't see me they just might hear me. I have the stock exhaust I could throw back on the bike but I am unsure of just what it sounds like. Any opinions would be appreciated. Thanks for reading and I am glad to be here on the forum. I hope to learn a lot since this is my first bike

 

Very nice bike, man. Welcome to the CBRF.

Gawd... wonder why he decided to match the bike to the helmet!?
Other way around, folks! lol..

As far as removing that paint.... that's a good question. I guess it all depends on what kind of paint it is. It's gonna be hard to recommend something for that job....

 

What a find , very nice bike man, welcome to the Forum

I'd strip it and respray.

 

Nice find and welcome aboard.

Might try eBay to find a stock yellow tank and sell that one to balance the costs. No chance those aren't vinyls? The edges on the patterns look a little... edgy. Might be lucky and just need time with a hair dryer

 

Thanks for the comments everyone!

It is definetly not vinyl. If you get close you can see brush marks. From looking at the pictures I guess you cannot see the brush marks but in person they are there. Also when you run your hand across it you can tell that it is not a smooth surface but layered and slightly uneven in spots. I dont think there is any kind of a clear coat or a sealer on top of the custom paint.

 

You can try two things to get the paint off if you haven't succeeded in doing it yet. 1. Try paint thinner..ONLY on pin striping and painted area.. this will soften your clear coat if you use too much so be careful. 2. Sand the painted area with some kind of 3000 grit sand paper.. you could try 1500 if you want, and sand until the paint is gone. This will require buffing the tank back to get the clear to "shine" again. If you have no experience buffing... try going to a body shop and see if the painter could do it. I'm a painter and could do it no problem without having to respray the whole tank.. maybe re-clear it at the most, so a local painter could do it as well. Good luck.

 

Hi & welcome aboard to CBRF!
Congrats on getting the F4i,shes in great shape and has low miles to boot.
Like rob02 stated above,try using paint thinner in a small spot on the pinstriping and see what happens.If it starts to come off,just continue to remove the rest of the god awful paint work till its gone.
Keep us posted on that.
RIde safe & enjoy the forum