Paint experts?

[BLUEJEEPLAB]

I want to repaint my newly acquired Special over the winter (since I need to take the ding I put in the tank fixing 5th gear out , go figure). What's the secret to clear coat? I know I can spill gas (not that I like to) on my cages and not ruin the clear coat. However, I re-did my XT 500 two years ago and the first thing that happened was I got that STUPID threaded gas gap on cross threaded and seeped a little gas on the tank and the clear coat IMMEDIATELY gave up and wrinkled. Did I do a dumb thing using spray bomb Clear Coat? Or does Clear Coat need a bake to be durable?

I would love to have a nice Deep Blue Metallic XS next summer, but ...

[Artic_rider]

Just one coat? I would put at least 4 on, all sanded and polished in between coats...that's what I did with the honda anyways, and never had any trouble...damn, where's the wood...I got to go knock on it now.

[randy]

The only spray bomb clear that I am sure is gas resistant is Duplicolor High Heat Clear.

[ivers]

i have done some painting and the best thing to do is use some spray on ppg. use the recomended clear to reducer ratio for the first couple of coats, wet sand in between coats, and after the first coulple of coats start thinning out the ratio more and more with each coat, being careful not to paint any runs.
this should get your clear straight and smooth.

[skids]

The one thing you do NOT want to do is to spray urethane over the top of laquer. It WILL create a nightmare!!!

[LoserShoes]

Most of the automotive clear coats use a catalyst that requires some heavy duty respirator type equipment to so that the sprayer will survive the process.

Steve

[BLUEJEEPLAB]

I think this might be a good enough reason to drop the hints to SWMBO Claus that I need a decent air compressor for Christmas. I might start by re-doing the XT again, if it looks like Dog Doo Doo, no great loss, it's a dirt bike

[ccogswel]

If you want good results buy good paint. If you want bad results well you get the idea. I would buy some good paint maybe Dupont or basf paint. The guys at the paint store can sell you what you need and sell you the paint, reducer, hardener if you go enamel. I would go base coat clear coat. You will get everything you need that will work with each other. Just painted a 84 Honda Magna in enamel paint. Plum Crazy Purple. Then placed a clear coat. When we filled it up with gas the first time we over filled it. Didn't wrinkel. Thats good for me as I have a reputation I have to keep.

Just one more thing, with body work. Take your time. Time well spent here will make a BIG difference when its all done. Prime and sand and prime and sand and.....

Chris

[Shuriken]

Even a marginally good paint job on your XS will do more for it than almost anything else, especially if you paint the frame and other components.

I agree with ccogswel.

I thought I was smart one day and thought I'd give the tank a good acrylic spray paint job. I spent hours and hours prepping the tank. Then I sprayed it with rattle can primer, followed by several coats of high quality rattle-can gloss-black. By the time I sprayed the final black coat, I had worked up a fantastic gloss. I then placed the tank by a large box fan for drying. The fan tipped over on it and ruined all that I did.

Well, then I thought I would get smarter, so I repeated the process. But this time it dried fine and then I cleared it with rattle can clear coat. The whole thing dried well and looked fantastic.

Well, first trip down the road that little o-ring under the gas cap let gas fumes (just fumes) vent out of the tank and the clear coat immediately failed. I then had a seriously ugly tank.

So I thought I'd get even smarter and became fed up with seeing such nice paint jobs on other bikes. I forked out over $200 dollars at House of Kolor and bought the following from them:
RU-311 Reducer
KU-150 Catalyst
UC-35 Clear
BC-25 Black
KP-21 Primer

Those were pints and quarts mind you, not gallons! That gets really expensive....

This time I mixed the primer with the activator and had an air gun. That primer is awesome stuff. Let it dry and it hardened right up. Sanded really smooth. Then of course I applied the gloss black in several coats, the final being as wet and glossy as I could get without runs. Finally, I mixed the hardener with the clear coat and clear coated the tank.

It took days and days to dry, but nothing I could have tried to do to ruin that tank mattered. This paint method put a very hard, thick, protective shell of clear and black on that tank that gas never touched.

Of course, those products are not acrylic paints - they are urethane based paint systems. That's the difference.

That was my first ever experience using a spray gun and that quality of paint.

This is what the bike looked like to start with.

This is what it looked like after I painted it.

Not perfect, but not bad for a first time job.

I've since used HOK Paint again with similar results. Additionally, I've sprayed acrylic paint from a paint gun from an e-bay seller with decent results. This paint comes out really thin and runs easy, but also applies very easy. I'm not totally impressed, but it's much better than the rattle-can enamel.

Yes, prep is the key. One single sandpaper scratch if not totally covered by primer will show through. If everything under your base coat is as smooth as a baby's butt, you're off to a good start. Sanding in between coats yields very good results too, although I did not do that when I painted my bike.

Ben

[bandet01]

i am working on spray bombing mine right now and i am painting mine indigo blue with ocean blue as a grapic paint and i plan on putting 6 coats of clear on mine when it is all said and done and i am only using dupli color paints and a spray bomb paint job will look as good as a pro job if you take your time

[BLUEJEEPLAB]

Bandet,

I'd be cautious about the Dupli Color Clear coat. That's what I used on my rattle can job on my XT and the clear coat wrinkles faster than you can say "Oh S***" when it comes in contact with gasoline.

I am going to try and get off work early one day soon and get to a the Car Paint store here in Fairborn and see what they reccomend for my situation.

Everyone here is right about prep. Details count. I learned that with the XT. Even with a rattle can, it came out great. I did wet sand between coats (5 color and 4 clear). A tiny scratch in the base gets magnified by color.

One other lesson learned from the XT job, don't put clear coat over vinly tape or graphics, they don't like it and you have to start all over

[LoserShoes]

Don't know if you guys know this already, but the easiest way to get the prep right is to spray a coat of primer of one color, then a coat of primer of a different color on top of it. When you can sand all the top color off and not go through the bottom layer, its ready for the color coat. Really shows all the fine scratchs that don't showup till the color goes on.

Steve

[randy]

BLUEJEEPLAB;

You're right about the duplicolor clear coat. ANY REGULAR clear coat will dissolve in gas just like their other paints.

The clear coat that I used is the HIGH HEAT CLEAR COAT. It is gas resistant as well as heat resistant. It's their part number DE 1636.

I've had it on Swamp Thing for two seasons now and I've had my share of spils and drips at fill-ups with NO wrinkling or marring of the finish

[prometheus578]

Nice job there, Ben.
Yup, when painting, one must always be on the lookout for fallin' box fans... That, and the floatin' doghair!

[chevy45412001]

prep

Yes prep is the single most important thing you can do for a nice paint job. I like the urathane primers myself,they are very hard to sand but well worth the effort. After my color was down i wet sanded with 1,000 grit then applied graphics removed tape then wet sanded till ridges were gone then three nice coats of clear followed by wet sanding to git rid of the orange peel and small dust bunnyies. looks good to me.Alas now i got an airbrush..can't wait till the snow flies to try my hand at truely custom paint work . Even though i have zero art talent