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Polishing a turd

timebombprod

timebombprod

Forum Sage
Maybe a bit harsh but shes definitely not gonna look pristine after cleaning up.


How do I go about minimizing the imperfections on the engine and such, not looking for this bike to look like a museum piece, it wouldn't either way lol, just want to get it looking good.

Snapchat-1746363452.jpg
 
Looks good to me! Nice enough from 10 feet is nice enough! You can just touch it up to stop the flaky bits from getting worse- that can't be too hard in Florida..? I do like a perfect bike but when it comes to a restore of a 40 year old motorcycle, it's intensive and $$$. ...and then, somebody will be blinded by the glory and knock it over it in a parking lot. (sigh)
 
Gorminrider said:
Looks good to me! Nice enough from 10 feet is nice enough! You can just touch it up to stop the flaky bits from getting worse- that can't be too hard in Florida..? I do like a perfect bike but when it comes to a restore of a 40 year old motorcycle, it's intensive and $$$. ...and then, somebody will be blinded by the glory and knock it over it in a parking lot. (sigh)
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Mainly just that weird worm stuff that i dont like. It does look great from 10 feet I can agree (thanks!) !

I'm actually most likely "done" with the bike so cosmetic is all that's left to mess with, but I dont want to spend the big bucks cosmetically restoring it, just want to know if theres any small stuff I could do to Make those ugly worm Mark's less visible. But I know that can go...."now my engine looks too good and the rest needs to match"
 
The crackling on the engine casing is the old factory clear coat. It is going to take a lot of elbow grease to get through this. I did mine by sanding with wet and dry sandpaper and water. I started with a 400 grit, then 600, 800 and 1000 grit The lower the grit the deeper the scratches that will have to be worked out. It makes it easier if you use a drill with some orbital Scotchbrite pads that are available in various grits and configurations to get into the corners. If you take the casings off you can buff them up with a grinder that has a buffing wheel. You you can get buffing wheels and various grits of buffing compounds that you can use on a drill or grinder at Harbour Freight at reasonable cost.
As for the tank... it looks as if it needs to be stripped and repainted. You might be able to get away with scuff sanding and repainting the black. You will have to mask off the rest of it and all wax would have to be removed. I would go to an automotive paint supplier, they will be able to advise as to what paint and clear coat to use that is impervious to gas spills.
 
Phred said:
The crackling on the engine casing is the old factory clear coat. It is going to take a lot of elbow grease to get through this. I did mine by sanding with wet and dry sandpaper and water. I started with a 400 grit, then 600, 800 and 1000 grit The lower the grit the deeper the scratches that will have to be worked out. It makes it easier if you use a drill with some orbital Scotchbrite pads that are available in various grits and configurations to get into the corners. If you take the casings off you can buff them up with a grinder that has a buffing wheel. You you can get buffing wheels and various grits of buffing compounds that you can use on a drill or grinder at Harbour Freight at reasonable cost.
As for the tank... it looks as if it needs to be stripped and repainted. You might be able to get away with scuff sanding and repainting the black. You will have to mask off the rest of it and all wax would have to be removed. I would go to an automotive paint supplier, they will be able to advise as to what paint and clear coat to use that is impervious to gas spills.
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Oh boy, well I might do the engine cases as it does bother me, but I do want to keep the original paint as I stripped off black spraypaint to find it underneath.

Thanks for the info might be getting to that clearcoat soon!
 
On engine cases I use this for the first pass to strip factory clear coat and assorted oxidation https://www.harborfreight.com/4-in-80-grit-nylon-abrasive-wheel-with-14-in-shank-60325.html. Works great when mounted on a drill press

Leaves a lot of circular marks, which can mostly be gotten rid of using scotchbrite "between finishing coats" pad. I use those in conjunction with PB blaster. That gets a decent finish quicker than progressive rounds of sand paper.

If I want it better, I then move to Meguar's Mag and Aluminum polish applied with those blue shop paper towels.

I also have a buffing wheel that I sometimes use, but it's not needed with the steps above.

here's an example from the current Goldwing project. I haven't yet cleaned up the cases on my GS project

PXL_20210217_230306610.jpg
 
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the tank chips..Personally, I fight long and hard to keep original paint. You can hold off the entire repaint with some automotive touch up kits or nail-polish ((which is much the same thing and -yes-comes in black too!) But, it won't be exact whichever. Just maybe "better" and "stop it getting worse"...aka degenerating to a "50 foot bike".

Otherwise... there are methods involving model paints and artist brushes that go beyond the labour expected of common sense and a repaint of the whole....but they are troublesome and are just something to try if you are ready to repaint when it goes badly wrong. :)
 
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It's a survivor bike, treat it as such! "Telling a man his motorcycle is pretty is like telling him his pen!$ is cute"
 
Wow. I'm going to be really careful what I say if I'm ever in Missouri. ...local usage I guess. T'wouldn't elicit quite that connection here- at least I think not..
 
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Gorminrider said:
Wow. I'm going to be really careful what I say if I'm ever in Missouri. ...local usage I guess. T'wouldn't elicit quite that connection here- at least I think not..
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Waiting for the weather to warm up a bit so I can add these to my windshield.

IMG_20210219_130234062.jpg
 
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