What color should I paint the frame?

[Guest]

I have a 1981 suzuki gs450l. I am pulling the bike apart in a few weeks to have the tank and plastics painted. I am painting them a factory Ford color, which is called frosted glass metallic. I cant decide what will look better a flat black frame or aluminum colored frame. I plan on cleaning up the engine and all the chrome. any thoughts are greatly appreciated. Sorry for the large image, but i cant get it to resize. this is a sample of what the tank will be painted.

[Flyboy]

I would go with high gloss black, to break the silver, otherwise it will be too much, will accent it nicely, light against dark.

[DannyMotor]

Gunmetal.

[7981GS]

Pink with orange dots.


Or, a nice shiny black.

Eric

[ValorSolo]

I like the gun metal that Danny used, but a semi gloss black or even satin black, would also look good.
Just stay away from the pink with orange dots.

[tatu]

No, Chrome it.

[SVSooke]

Did the 85 750EF frame in a "stainless steel" finish

Looks pretty good.

Did the 78 1000 in gloss black

Not quite done yet

[Octain]

No, Chrome it.

Wow, now that's a first!

I've not ever seen many bikes with frame colors other than black that I liked.
Frames should be black unless they came otherwise from the factory.

[tatu]

Wow, now that's a first!

I've not ever seen many bikes with frame colors other than black that I liked.
Frames should be black unless they came otherwise from the factory.

Mine's chrome.

Aaand the next one's going to be white.

[alleyrat]

RED!

[GateKeeper]

do it orange....I know it's primer, but it looks cool, lol



or black

[ndaugbjerg]

tatu,
That's beautiful but I hope you plan to ride it. I did a 10pt. resto on a '67 BSA a few years back. Dragged it around to shows for a couple of years and collected a lot of tacky trophy's. One day I realized that cleaning and polishing really wasn't that much fun. I decided,"To hell with shows" and started riding it. That's when I realized what I had and started enjoying it for the first time.
Niels

[alleyrat]

I make no bones about it....I ride it hard....it's no trailer queen....

[tatu]

tatu,
That's beautiful but I hope you plan to ride it. I did a 10pt. resto on a '67 BSA a few years back. Dragged it around to shows for a couple of years and collected a lot of tacky trophy's. One day I realized that cleaning and polishing really wasn't that much fun. I decided,"To hell with shows" and started riding it. That's when I realized what I had and started enjoying it for the first time.
Niels

Niels, thanks for the compliment, It's never been to a show and it's my main rider (+ my triumph scrambler) that photo was taken a couple'v years back when I was building it. Its still not finished yet, there's a white seat for it waiting to go on. Its been ridden all through the last winter, and here it is in my shed as I left it seven weeks ago uncleaned. To be fair it does clean really easily. I'm going to tear into the engine after my next project and rebuild it all again and at the same time do the cam float mod that is on here.
It doesn't matter where it parked or moving it always attracts a crowd and turns heads.
Further to what is being said on customing bikes on other threads, if it were desired there is nothing on this that isn't undoable to put it back as it left the factory.

[Flyboy]

Stunning Chris, absolutely stunning....
Love the new wire wheels.