Body Work & Paint

Repainting Cylinders

Larry Rymal (Rymal1):

Remove the engine to repaint the black of the cylinders? Oh, gosh no!

Look, sit down on the ground next to your bike. Look it over, admire it. You can repaint the cylinder black for both cylinders in under 30 minutes. At the same time, you can touch-up nicks on the frame tubes in under ten. All of this is done with rattle can spray paint.

All I did was just get some tape, scrap paper and covered areas that don't do well with over-spray. I just keep it very simple. Even scrap cardboard held up to cover a fender works. Nothing meticulously sanded or prepped because you are going to have to do this each season, if you want that nice look. Takes every bit of 15 minutes. At the end of winter, I give the bike a good cleaning, checking of rust pits on the chrome, etc., and include the painting treatment at the same time. There's nothing to this.

BBQ grill black paint sticks to nearly anything. Just prep the fins by cleaning them with a brush. I don't prep by sanding anything.

Your painting is not going to be the fine work of art like painting your tank would be. You are just spraying the cylinder fins and their black. That's all. And after you sand the newly dried paint off the fin edges, you'll be amazed just how great it all looks.

BBQ grill paint, Flat-black HI-TEMP Exhaust paint is great for this sort of thing. As a side note, any Rust-O-Leum glossy black is great for touching up your frame tubes, in case nicks have exposed the metal.

Painting Your Bike

EXCELLENT THREAD ON HOW TO PAINT - ALL THE DETAILS: What to do, what to buy, tricks, etc, etc, etc.

http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=54168.1

Painting the Frame

We got a pretty close match to the frame black Yamaha uses on our 1100's. It's based on a paint code for a 04-05 Fiat code 741 Cioccolato Peyrano. It is in NAPA Martin Senour Gold Urethane 5.0 single stage and will make 1 QT. If you take this formula in to just about any NAPA store, they should be able to hook you up. - Sick Mick

CF-100 Strong Black 459.2

CF-102 Orange 10.5

CF-129 Clean Yellow 3.8

CF-122 Strong White 3.8

CF-132 Magenta 3.2

CF-212 5.0 UE Mix 442.9

Some Interesting Forum Threads:

1. Painting Using Stencils - http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=40113.1
2. Painting Chrome Side Covers - http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=40113.1
3. How Much Paint? - http://forums.delphiforums.com/n/mb/message.asp?webtag=yamaha1100&msg=40089.1

SPRAY/SHAKER CAN PAINTING

SwaMan (swa3) Shaker Can Acrylic Lacquer with Enamel Clear Topcoat

If there are any back-porch painters here who have or are contemplating a rattle can paint job, I may have some valuable advice. Last year, I used Duplicolor rattle-cans to do a home grown custom job on my bike, using techniques I learned at a trade school in the 70's.

The job came out purrrrrrfect, and colorsanding and buffing gave it a glass like finish. NOBODY knew it wasn't a $1200.00 pro job! The entire bike was done in acrylic lacquer, out of SPRAY CANS for under $50.00.

ALAS, the first gas spill completely destroyed my work, forcing me to decide whether to try again, or pay the bucks for a professional job. Poor slob that I am, I opted to read up on paint types and give it another go. I even enquired on here about finding a fuel safe alternative top coat.

Well.....now the GOOD NEWS! ENAMEL spray paint is much more gas and solvent resistant!!! I sprayed the top of an extra tank (thanks, Ebay) with Duplicolor acrylic enamel clear, let it dry for a week, poured gas all over it, and waited........and WAITED. Guess what happened. NUTHI'N! Washed it off with a little soap and water, and it shined like a diamond.

I went ahead and repainted (a classic style, with 40's HD colors) the bike again, with acrylic lacquer, and used ENAMEL clear topcoat

You CAN do this, but NOT lacquer on top of enamel. This bike (IMHO) looks great! Although I'm in NO hurry to test my theory on chemical resistance, I'm quite confident that this job is gonna hold up MUCH better than the last

ecook280

As far as prep goes, I wiped the parts down with wax and grease remover, I don't recall the exact brand I used, got it at the local auto parts store. After that I sanded them down with 220 grit just to see how much body work I had to do. After all the body work was done, sanded with 220 and then 440 grit, wiped them down again, 1 coat of primer, sand with 800 grit, wiped them down again, 2 coats of Duplicolor High Gloss Black.

mitchelguita

-- I will tell you the best trick for painting with a spray can. It is to heat the can up by running it under hot tap water. Heat it for ten minutes, than shake the can. If the can get cold repeat until the can remains warm in your hand. The results are a fine mist.

-- The other thing to remember is distance for flat black you want the paint to lay down dry. To do this, keep the distance between 10 and 12 inches away. For a gloss look the distance should be 7 to 9 inches away. Start spraying before you reach the object, and stop after you fully pass over the object.

-- For flat black you can get by with over lapping only a quarter of the pervious spray. For gloss over lap one half the pervious spray. Don’t worry about runs as they can always be sanded out.

Steve - working class choppers

-- I would also recommend if you can find it using "Plasti-Kote" engine flat black

-- I use the engine enamel everywhere as it holds up to heat, oil, gas etc.

-- I do not recommend "Duplicolor" which is the readily available automotive spray paint where i live - pain in the ass and cure time is terrible - paint in 1 hr or you have to wait 7 days to cure - i have had this stuff lift on me before and it sux

-- The "Plasti-Kote" will allow you to recoat anytime you like.

Drostar100

I agree Duplicolor sucks........I used it once and it never did fully harden, you could make a dent in it with your fingernail two weeks later. When I went to sand it off and re do it, the paint wouldn't even sand it was so soft. I had to chemically strip it and it peeled off like rubber almost.

Powder Coating

How-To Articles

NOTE: Temperatures needed for "baking" the powder coating can be achieved easily by a home sytpe oven, but .... DO NOT USE ANY OVEN YOU WILL BE USING FOR HOME BAKING, ETC - RESIDUALS OF THE PROCESS ARE LIKELY TO BE POISONOUS

Powder Coating & Polishing Basics - Motorcycle Cruiser Magazine

Polishing

DIY Stainless Steel Polishing - imnezrider (mdpar3)

"For stainless steel, the most common is:

- 143 a medium cut (gray) stainless steel compound or polish (good for a consistent finish and light scratches)

or

- 126 white bar for a mirror finish on stainless steel.

These compounds both work well with an 8 inch X cs (concentric sewn) buffing wheel X 40 ply -- the tighter the stitching the more aggressive and faster it will polish. Then using the same type of buff with less stitching for mirror finish."

Couple of buffing wheels, compound. Clamp your trusty drill upside down in your vise, chuck up a pad and do it. May not be high tech, but very little expense...and gets the job done.

Body Work (updated 05/26/12)

Gas Tank Edge Roll Threads: (updated 11/06/11)

http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=42984.1

http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=53565.1

http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=54183.1

Fiberglass Repair Thread: http://forums.delphiforums.com/yamaha1100/messages?msg=51100.1

Gas Tank Stretch: http://650ccnd.com/tankstretch.htm

Nut-Serts - From: Scratch (Grisamore) on the Forum: (updated 05/14/11)

For those that want know about these little gems. Some of the names are, nut-serts, riv-nuts, sheet metal inserts. You can get them at an auto parts store. Very handy to know about, lets you install nuts in just about anything. I've used these for replacing my seat nuts and stud, installing my chin scoop and too many to count in race cars.

Here are two nut-serts and the special tools to install them. You do not have to have these special tools unless you are doing this all the time. You can use a bolt, nut and washer set up as shown.

ROLLING THE FUEL TANK SEAM

Forum threads - Rolling The Fuel Tank Seam Thread Link - Another Fuel Tank Seam Thread Link - Yet Another Fuel Tank Seam Thread

Definitely one of the best ways to really clean up the looks of the V Star 1100 gas tank. You'll end up with a very clean "custom" looking tank. This is highly recommended if you are going through the expense and effort of painting. It's easily done with a few simple body and hand tools.

You can either roll it a quarter turn or all the way over with a full half turn. Both end up looking great, the quarter turn fills a little more of the frame gap, but it also takes a small amount of additional body work.

Most use a body hammer and a dolly along with pliers depending on how far you intend to roll it. You can do the initial bending with pliers, taking your time to partially bend the seam down a little at a time. It'll start to bend fairly easily, just go slow and bend a little at a time to avoid breaking the weld.

For the quarter bend, once the bending process has started, place the dolly behind the seam and again, slowly work your way around the tank keeping the seam as straight as possible (you'll need less body filler that way). Stop when the welded seam is parallel with the tank. Fill in any hammer marks with your favorite body filler and sand, then prep for paint.

For the half/or full bend, just continue bending the seam all the way over. This may put more stress on the weld, however we have had no reports of tanks leaking afterwards.

Finish as you would doing any body work prep for paint. Fill and sand, seal and paint. You'll be VERY happy with the results.

The rolling process shown below.... take your time and keep everything as straight as possible to avoid using too much body filler.

The look of the completed quarter roll really gives the tank a much cleaner look.

Thanks to Donn and Bill for the pics!