I had HD (actually Calibre does/did it for them) paint my tank to get rid of the tank decal. Tank came out perfect! And it was really reasonable and paint and pinstripes matched perfect too. I'd do again in a minute. Do they paint fiberglass (or nylon) parts now? They did not do that back in 2001 when I had mine done.
Jerry

I just looked at the 09 catalog. The only touring bikes they list are Road Kings. No bikes with fairings. Dayum! Those are great prices tho. Gotta keep this in mind for future projects.

 

No way. If the original paint is in good shape, scuff it, shoot it with some sealer. You might use a whole pint on two fenders & a tank. Another pint of color, and a pint of clear. Even if you up those quantities to a quart each, you're still not getting anywhere close to $500 in materials - for a painter.

Now, if you are going to buy all the materials for the project, you could probably top $300 pretty easy, because you're buying reducers and hardeners and everything else as well. But a painter already has all that, bought by the gallon. A job using a standard color off the mix bank isn't likely to run more than $100 in materials.

Now, if you get into custom paints like Planet Color, House of Kolor, Alsa, etc., you can possibly spend $500 for a quart of the paint alone.

Almost the entire cost of a paint job is in the labor. Paint and materials usually make up less than 7% of the cost.

 

I don't disgree with you, however if you are trying to cover Black Pearl wth Sunglo Red you know it doesn't cover real well. The only thing I was suggesting is that the price is low, I hope this guy gets a bang up job and he's happy.

 

On a scuff and shoot, I'd lay down sealer as the first step. Depending on how I wanted the Sunglo red to look, I might go with either red sealer, or white.

Yeah... cheap paint jobs are scary. $1,200 to shoot a set of tins isn't too terribly cheap, in relation to the labor involved. Some independent guy who needs to earn some quick cash could easily do it for that price, and do a good job.

It's the really cheap paint jobs that scare me. I can't tell you how many people come to me after someone has given them exactly what they paid for, and now they want to know how to get it fixed. One lady tells me she got quotes to get a complete on her car, all the in $4,000-$5,000 range. So she found a guy who said he'd do it for $800. ... and he did an $800 paint job on her car. Of course, it was awful, and she hated it. She wanted my advice on what she should do from there. I told her my first bit of advice was when someone quotes you $800 on a job you know generally runs $4,000-$5,000, you have to know he is going to cut ever corner, and you should run away immediately. My second bit of advice was to chalk up her $800 loss to experience, and take the care to a professional, who'd now do it for her for $6,000.

But, anyway, back to bikes... Yeah - $1,200 is a reasonable price for a straight color shoot.

 

I just took my bike to my local dealer to get painted thru the Spectrum paint program. I have a Deluxe that is colbalt & white, I am sending it back to get vivid black & white. (06 colors) It was $1574.00. That included stripping down all 3 pieces to bare metal and paint. the dealer charged 6 hours labor @ $70.00 per hour to remove, ship out & re-install the tins.