Painting

[Troyskie]

WARNING, long story here....

I'm mostly through the 'project', and didn't really consider it a project at first.
I thought I'd post it here as a lesson in how not to get too over-enthusiastic about painting a bike.

Well, to clarify, I'd suggest doing one bike at a time.

I've three 84's and one 86. All need cosmetic love.

I started with the 86 as I'd recently added a few scrapes and dents. ( http://www.fjowners.com/index.php?topic=17603.0 )

Plastic repair is something I've now become intimately familiar with. The 86 main fairing was smashed and I bought two replacement ones to make one good one. It turns out that the combination of the smashed one, and the other two allowed me to repair the two replacements!

Unfortunately, doing all the plastic repairs on them is a will sapping exercise. I used Plastex (there are a few versions like it) and a combination of acetone and plumbing parts/kids Lego to make and mould the missing tabs. I've yet to actually plastic weld with a heat gun/filler rod.

The 86 was roadworthy & although pretty ugly, ready for the Aussie FJ Rally.

Upon return it was time to get it ready for painting.

STREWTH!!! How many more cracks can I find?

Hours and hours later, my technique is certainly honed.

The next hurdle....painting.

I can't paint well enough for the bikes to look good so I now have to find a car/bike painter. For those of you living in big cities, or even near big cities, this would not really be a drama. Unfortunately I live in a rural area hours from the nearest decent sized city.

Fortune favours me and I find a guy who is both very good and willing to do the job for cash after hours.

Now it gets interesting. If the guy can do one bike, why not the others.........? They are all ambulance scheme.....hmmm, perhaps I can make this a bigger project and get the 'fleet' looking good....I check with the guy if doing three bikes the same colours (with the 86 being a bit different in the combos of colour) is going to be 'cheaper' or easier in bulk. He said ok before I had a good look at the plastics on the other bikes.

Holy crackville! What have I done to myself.

'Can you do plastic repair as well?' I ask the guy. 'Of course' he says, but it will cost more as he has a 'mate' that does it at work and is also willing to work after hours for cash. Hmmm, a professional to do the repairs for cash, or a lifetime in my shed at night after the kids are asleep and my wife is wondering who she married? Yep, cash to the pro it is.

All is going swimmingly, albeit slowly as this is after hours. A local sign guy has access to all the nice sticker material to make perfect decals. We spend hours together going over all the spare and donor plastics making sure the colours and sizes are right. That dark metallic blue sticker is the hardest one to get right. WE get the push from the painter to get it together and make a final push to have it all correct and ready. The shed day I recently agreed to is looming and I can't wait to put all the bits on the bikes and smile knowlingly about how 'easy' it all was.....NOT!

Then I receive a txt from the painter. 'Call me urgent', oh no....It turns out one of the other painters doing after hours cash really screwed up. The deal they had with their boss was that they could use the booths & equipment as long as it wasn't cars or anything else that would compete with the bosses business. I don't know what went wrong, but upon calling he said the job is off, he can't do it now, I'll have to pick up all the bits. Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo.....what am I going to do?

I call the people the 'guy' suggested. One does custom cars and hotrods and has not done a complete bike before, let alone 4 bikes worth of parts in various states of prep. Another guy puts his hand up. It turns out he painted a fairing for me some years ago. Not a bad job, but the pin-stripe was wrong and there were a couple of other bits wrong, but in fairness, they were given little instruction as I was not sure myself and didn't care as much as I do now. With just a few weeks remaining before the shed day I commit to the second guy.

This almost brings us to where I'm at now. The shed day has come and gone, my bikes are all naked and unused for about 4 months now. I grabbed all my shit left-over bits and bodged them onto my 'new' 11 'big bore'. Ok, now at least I have a bike to ride wile I'm waiting for the painter to stop putting other stuff ahead of me.

At the shed day we discover the new 11 has a pretty messed up swingarm (http://www.fjowners.com/index.php?topic=18099.msg182138#new) , so I swap everything over to my first 11 (I'm pretty good at it by now), go for a fang and yippee!!! Oh how good it feels.

This week I dropped in to the painter (a weekly excercise in irritation and patience building). I normally get to deal with a guy that thinks any bike without HD on it is a waste of time, and that painting any bike other than a HD is an equal waste. I then get to put up with how crap it is to paint bikes, Yamaha sucks, and he's the funniest, cleverest fat c#!t in the world, and why am I bothering with these old crap piles. As this is not a cash job I politely ask when, and we also need to coordinate the decal due.

To my amazement the boss came out and took me out the back. To my great pleasure the HD f-wit was not doing the job, he's just customer service (he he), the leading hand and his apprentice have been doing the work with all my large scale colour prints of the bikes for reference. The parts are have completed repair and priming is almost finished, except for one tank, and a couple of other parts.

I'm not sure if they will paint them all at once. As they are small parts, and many of the small parts are Silky White I'm hoping they will knock them off and then move on to the main fairings and tanks. The side covers are slightly more complex with the red stickers on the insides yet to be sorted.

That brings the saga up to date. My first 11 needs a top end refresh, my second 11 needs a new swingarm. the wiring is really butchered, and it needs new throttle cables, my third 11 is a project that is completely untouched except the plastics will be half ok, and I now know the engine runs (thanks Pete!), the 86 1200 should be good to go once I get everything back, and ready for kookaloo.

I put this into projects as I'm certain re-assembly will be 'interesting', plus there are the other 'opportunities' for maintenance whilst the bikes are naked.

[Troyskie]

Woo hoo!

I think being frustrated enough to globally share my woes has worked with the 'it sucks to be Troy' gods (there are happily not too many of them).

I interrupted a meeting to answer a call from  what I thought was the kids school. Nope, paint mob. They cheerfully let me know I had better come and get some parts that are finished. I just was told there are so many bits from so many bikes they were worried they'd be scratched.

Much to my sons disgust we head over to the paint shop right after school pick up  (he had an urgent appointment on Fortnite before soccer practice).

I am very pleased. They've matched the Silky White beautifully.

Here's a pic with a rough but clean OEM part for comparison....

[Troyskie]

Oh, I forgot to mention, the paint shop also asked me to drop off a bike so they can check fit and lineup of the fairing/tank/side covers.

A nice touch but a pain in the arse for me. Fortunately, Aldi had their annual sale recently. At the sale among the socks, balaclavas, helmets and other things were aluminium ramps rated at 270kg for bikes. Just enough for an FJ

He he he, hold my beer, these will be good for loading the ride on mower. The box says 'Not to be used in pairs'. He he he, sure. At $70 each I'll take the risk. It's better than my current half assed way!

Anyhoo, one ramp later the project bike with the smashed bits and many other half parts is on the trailer.

On arrival HD fat c+#t fwit is given the job of wheeling project bike in as lineup model.

Tomorrow I'll try and get some piccies of the set up in the paint shop

[Sparky84]

Looking good, even looks like silver flecks are there.

You are punishing yourself with so many at once..

But you do have a shed with space for them all and more

Great Shed Day also

Cheers
Alan

[Troyskie]

I dropped into the paint shop to grab some piccies, they've made some more progress.

The I might have a pin hole in the tank from Effie and will find out Monday. Shouldn't be too much drama.

[Troyskie]

Update.......no progress at the paint shop.....in fact a bit of a backwards step.
One of the 4 tanks in for the sweet ambo job decided it needed to show off some holes....BUGGER (to quote a Kiwi)!
A quick bit of soldering and back to the paint shop (a bit more than that but, you know....).

A return to the sticker dudes. They showed me a bus they've restored back to an 80's mob here called Deluxe Coach Lines. Well, anyone in the 80's in Oz knew Deluxe, they owned the long distance coach business. I choose not to recall the number of Perth to Sydney trips I did on those coaches. I was a real blowout to see an old Denning coach back in it's 80's livery. Then they showed me my sets ready to go. We compared them to all my shit bits and they are perfect!!!!!!! Just need the painters that can complete a 40 foot bus to work on my bikes.....he he he.

After that little kick in the balls (about getting my job done compared to an entire bus!!!!)) I'm hoping we'll be applying stickers to my bikes next week........if the HD f-wit is on break.....(only joking.....not).

The big panic right now is if the sticker dudes use water to apply the decals. If so the paint masters reckon another 2 weeks to dry. the sticker dudes say no, 2 weeks is wrong, they never dry.......WTF!!!!!

Scary moment averted, apparently using water is another relic of the 80's and they don't do that, they just get it right (he he he, magic).

In fairness to the paint shop, they quoted me a grand a bike & although there are 3 complete bikes, there are actually almost 4 bikes of bits as I've chosen to get a spare 1200 main fairing, spare bottom cowl, and spare tank painted with the others. That takes it to almost 4 bikes in reality (all sweet ambo). We shall see, as with each visit they explain how much extra work it is.

The white is three coats, and the red is three coats then another two. Both get two clear coats, one before stickers and one after.

Here's something weird, I've noticed that only the tank pin stripe and name, and the pin stripe on the fairing and sidecovers are under the factory clear. All the other stickers are over the factory clear coat. Also, the factory clear is inconsistent. Sometimes heavy, sometimes very thin.

During this process I've decided that real hard core concourse is not for me. I've only just come to understand what concourse really means, and it is not what me or my bikes are about. I want to ride my beautiful babies, not trailer them everywhere. So, they will be shiny, nice, and with one exception close, but not quite stock. One bike will be totally stock (Effie). The others will be evil HP monsters that are disguised as FJs. Even Effie is an evil HP monster of her day. But all the girls will be in their sweet ambo bikinis!

Am I rambling, yes. Why? I've actually nothing of use to report on my project.

As an aside (cause I've nothing of use to report), I did find quite a number of bits available in Japan from 36Y bikes wrecked over the years. I've collected an original under seat toolkit, windscreen, cans, headers, miscellaneous bits an pieces, and a swingarm. Most from  bikes that did less k's till now than I do each month. Why didn't I buy one of the bikes? I missed them and they were almost all gone (sad face). I've sucked Japan dry of good parts now. The best bits after that I've found online are either in the US (Unusually Severely expensive), the UK (Unexpectedly Knowledgeably expensive) or Germany (Great, but expensive, or DE-Don't Expect cheap).
As far as Aussie parts go. Well, I think we've ridden most of our FJs so much that the odometer needed an extra two zeros to be realistic. Most of our parts are totally f!cked and worn out. If that isn't the case then some d!ckhead like me probably crashed it.

Perhaps I'll head over tomorrow and see if the HD F-wit is on break and the parts are up for some more work. If not, I'll see how close I get to Ghandi before I lose my shit and start making a fuss.

[Troyskie]

Progress!

Still slow going, perhaps another week or two, but PROGRESS!!!

[dammag]

The red looks great!

[Troyskie]

Thanks mate. They've matched the red perfectly, even with my glasses on .

For clarification the sequence for the red was described to me as (after primer), white base, two coats of red, then sparkle (G'day Mark), then clear, then rub, then clear.

[fj1289]

It is all looking good!

The common phrase is "Fast, cheap, or good - you can have only two of them!"   My experience with machine shops is you can only get one!  Paint must be the same way.

[Old Rider]

The paint looks great Trosky perfect match on the silky white also like the look of the glossy black on the rear part on the front fender.I think i will do that on mine If i ever get it running again

[Troyskie]

Here's some pics of the new red, both in the sun and in the shade.

The photos don't show it but the sparkle in the sun on the old part is much more noticeable. The new part is a slightly deeper red than the old.

I have another original red front mud guard and it is different again. Much closer to the new ones.

Given I live in the 'sun burnt land' I'm assuming there is some fade after 30 odd years. I was specific in the side of the old guard (no pun) I chose for the photos as the LHS. If parked on the side stand it is typically leaning over and there is less direct sun angle. Not guaranteed of course, but better than nothing. The RHS is noticeably more faded.

I gave the painters a NOS front guard in a nice felt bag to use as an example of Yamaha Stormy Red, with 'don't touch' written on some tape stuck to it. Somehow it was rubbed and primed for a repaint with the other parts.

Although it is not an exact match I think I prefer the deeper red. There is a definite sparkle in the red. I'll try and do another photo inside with a white light to get it to show up on the pic. I'll post it in higher res than the others, so apologies to those on low bandwidth, but it shouldn't be too bad.

Given the number of parts NOS and used I have now there are some surprising differences between the shades of Stormy Red. Some are noticeably lighter than others. On the side of tanks I see the red can be as deep as I now have, and on the upper bits near the pinstripe they are much lighter. Side covers vary quite a bit between left and right.

To repeat a bit, I think the deeper red I now have is great. It could also be that I simply can't be bothered or afford to get them to repaint a shade lighter and I'm making the most of what I now have  . Jokes aside, painting is always a batch process, so everything painted from the same batch will match, and anything from another batch will be different, even if it is just a smidge.

[ribbert]

Paint looks fantastic Troy. I thought they had paint codes for those colours, anyway, looks great and I love the colour.

I can just see them at the next manshed weekend, in the "Exhibit" section of your garage.

"Given I live in the 'sun burnt land" ..... Ah, if only Girt was a colour.

Noel

[Tuned forks]

Troyskie, your paint project is coming along nicely.  Yes, red can be a bitch to match and there are soooo many versions of white as well.  Red also fades fastest of all colors.  Don't be discouraged by the time your project is taking either.  It took me two years to repair the plastics and repaint my FZR1000.  That was just one bike, you've got four!

Joe

[Troyskie]

Now Noel you have gone and done it. Faded stormy red is now 'Girt'! After a few glasses we can be 'weeping spains' (that's a bit of a Longreach ....)

Thanks Joe. I did some more checking. Yamaha seem to have many shades of Stormy red. It is as I've mentioned earlier that painting is a batch process. My new red is as good a Stormy Red as any. After so many comparisons I think the quality is better than factory, so that's a no go for concourse