Designer & bike rider in British Columbia, Canada

R80 09 Paint and Polish

New year, new paint: the frame, wheels, tank, foot pegs, a few other odds and ends went off to the powder coaters last week, little shop near Lumby, BC, Canada.

And yes, the tank is being powder coated. Buddy is taking care of that side of things, I believe it’s a polyurethane gloss they can do these days. Scheme is “sparkle silver” for the tank, with a “skillet grey” accent. Frame and a few visible bits to be “black sandtex”.

Left to right powdercoat colour swatches: tank, tank highlight, frame.

While that’s away I’m going through the parts to do a second, more thorough inspection and clean. Lot of conflicting and anecdotal forums and blogs on various methods for cleaning steel and aluminum while at the same time we’re trying for a balance of restoration but keep a bit of that aged patina. This is a bike to be ridden and admired; it should have some soul. It’s not a showroom bike. To that end my aim is clean and polish things but not mirror finish. The fact that we’re powder coating a number of parts that were previously bare, does, however, get me thinking about having some parts as nicely polished aesthetic highlights, a sort of R.R. Kostellow dominant / subdominant / subordinate approach. To put it another way, if it’s a cool-looking piece I’ll clean it up goooood.

After clean and polish did a first coat of that Dupli-Color matte clear coat on the brake arm and rod…will post when I see how it turns out. I wonder how a base of mother’s mag will affect the clear coat? I wonder if mother’s mag or autosol is enough to protect the finish. The goal being the less hand scrubbing and re-application in the future, the better.

Got supplies: wetsand paper for aluminum refurb, autosol polish, matte clear coat (maybe?), degreaser, shop towels and microfibre polishing.
Rear brake arm and assembly. I honestly that the pull rod was supposed to be black.
Garage Dave brought in his Dad’s old 6″ bench grinder and a brand new brass brush, still in the packaging. Fit it on and…why have I been scrubbing by hand for so long?
Choke assembly after ultrasonic and simple green.
Rear brake arm after hand scrubbing and quick (10 min) ultrasonic simple green bath, followed by once-over with 400 grit wetsand, then Mother’s Mag. The pull rod was done on the wire wheel.
Got some work this month so splurged on lunch.

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