Not to sound like a jackass, but as soon as a wrench touches those bolt heads, the powder is gonna get jacked up.

 

Had a classmate of mine years back in the shop painting his Toyota supra. He painted fender and door bolts. I was like.... This guy is Fvcking retarded

 

Might be alright for the most part if he's careful, and I'm sure he's expecting some touch-up.

I chopped my rear fender and had it powdered flat black. A few weeks ago I dropped one of the fender spikes directly onto it, dead center from quite a ways up there, and about **** myself at the destruction I was about to witness. Nope, not a mark anywhere...can't even see where it made contact.

I don't doubt it will chip, scratch, etc...but nothing I have ever had powder coated at my industrial PC shop looks different than the day I brought them home. Truck, motorcycle, and dirtbike parts alike, they all love it. A needle file will definitely take some **** off though.

You prob. have more hands on PC experience than I do though.

Parts look great Ergo!

 

That's true with paint. Wrench will take paint off in a heartbeat. Not as true with powder. As Jackal points out, the stuff is very tough. And it doesn't flake off like paint does. You might scratch it, but that's all. In the first round of powder coating stuff back a few months ago I had them do the bolt heads for the front wheel. Was careful with the wrench in tightening them down and there's not a mark on them. That was the experiment and it worked so I had them do a lot more this time. We'll see. I did some on the rear wheel yesterday and I did scuff one of them (carelessness on my part) but you can't really even tell from two feet away. And as Jackal says, once everything is tightened down, if there are any marks I can always use some touch up paint if I have to. Pretty sure it's gonna work fine.

 

Getting really excited to get 'er done, doobs.

Had time yesterday to put the cam cover and the primary back on. Once they were in place we pulled it off the chain it's been hanging from and (very carefully) set it on the bench. Took the day off from work and will be putting the rocker covers back on, and then who knows from there. I'll be alone most of the day in the shop and can't mount the motor in the frame by myself so I'll do what I can do. I'll post pics later. We'll probably put the motor and frame together this weekend.

 

Thank you very much Branner.

Hmmmm...I didn't think that was a requirement in NYS. A check of the State Troopers website on required equipment for motorcycles doesn't say anything about a front fender, or a rear one for that matter. And I've looked in the V&T and can't find anything there either. I hope you're wrong about that. There's no going back for me now.


That's a possiblity. My wife is from your neck of the woods and if the weather will cooperate with a forecasted stretch of clear weather (no front fender, four and a half hours on the Thruway, in the rain...nahhhh) I'd love to ride the bike out there for a weekend.

 

Thanks pal.

 

Some places, the screw/bolt heads just look ugly in metal; I've painted a few in the past, just spray paint, and of course they lose paint tightening them down, but I just used a q-tip to dab paint on the exposed spots, and usually from two feet away you wouldn't notice it. I used the q-tips (could use small pointed paintbrushes, I just didn't feel like cleaning them for such a small use) so I wouldn't get overspray. Some colors will show any blemish pretty bad, but black is a real forgiving color. Those black bolt heads take extra work, but it's sure going to look better for it.

 

Right on man. The swing arm bolts, shock bolts are especially ugly. And I couldn't see blacking out the wheels, powder coating the rear sprocket and buying new black discs, and then using shiney metal bolts on the wheels. Here's the rear wheel all blacked out. All the powder coated hardware held up fine.



Finished reassembling the motor.





Then there was the frame...went to pick it up. As I walked in the powder guy was swearing up a storm. Just before I walked in he was waxing it, final step before wrapping it up so I could take it home, and he or someone there put a scratch just below the steering head on one of the down tubes, right on the outside where it would be hugely visible. He was beside himself. The thing looked gorgeous, perfect, except for that small but highly noticeable scratch. So they're going to do the whole thing over again. Said I could probably pick it up on Friday.

One thing I wanted to mention about the cam cover, for anyone who might be thinking about chopping it or just taking it off to have it powdercoated or painted. Most of the motorheads will know this of course, but for those that may not be aware, when you pull the cover you have to be extremely careful about the cam gears...they will slide out with the cover if you're not careful. If they do slide out, even a little bit, make sure when you push them back in you get them in exactly the same position they were in before you started. And if there's any doubt, pull out the manual and check the alignment against the cam gear diagram. All the gears have registration/alignment marks on them. Put a socket on gear 5, rotate the engine until they are in proper position and make sure the marks line up as shown.


This happened to me when I took the cover off after painting the engine. I was afraid they got out of alignment so I checked and sure enough I was off by two teeth on one of the gears. It pays to check.

Hopefully, I get the newly coated frame on Friday. I truly hope it looks as good as it did today, minus the scratch. Damn it was beautiful.

 

Good to know. I just chopped a cover and was about to order a manual for that exact purpose. I had also been trying to decide what it would look like PCed gloss black. Glad I now know.