amazinmets73

I'm planning a restoration project on a bike and will need to repaint the frame and fork. I've included photos to demonstrate the current condition. Any tips are much appreciated ☺




Frame is 853 steel and fork is carbon

Colnago Mixte

Do you have decals or a source? So I'm understanding correctly, you want to restore everything to the original stock yellow paint job?

amazinmets73

source?

No decals but they're relatively easy to find on eBay.

Yea leaning heavily towards yellow but would consider other colors. To my knowledge the yellow paint job is not stock; I believe it's a spray job by tbe previous owner.

Nessism

That looks like a stock paint job to me.

I'd start by removing the headset and crank. Then use paint stripper to remove as much paint as possible. The best paint stripper is the type that uses mineral spirits to rinse it off, not water. Once the majority of the paint is off use some sandpaper, or something like a maroon scotchbrite pad to scuff down all the metal and get everything smooth. If there is rust you can use some naval jelly or similar phosphate sauce to eat that off, and then back to some more scotchbrite pad work.

What kind of paint job varies depending on your expectations for cost and durability.

Colnago Mixte

OK, OP, lets get down to brass tacks here. On a scale of 1-10, how nice do you want the finished product to turn out? Upon this question, everything else hinges.

amazinmets73

I can't answer until I know the degree of labor intensity and expected expenditure of the project.

All things being equal I'd like a 10, but that's unlikely to be the case.

FWIW I don't wish to exceed $200 on the job.

Colnago Mixte

One last question, what's your time worth to you? Tell us, what is the maximum number of hours you are willing to spend on the project, and you will have an answer.

amazinmets73

8 hours

Colnago Mixte

A professional actually could paint your bike in 8 hours, start to finish, with excellent results. However, as an amateur, it would take far far longer than 8 hours, many mistakes would be made, and it would be a frustrating experience due to the extremely steep learning curve. Plus you don't have any of the equipment, I assume?

With your price range, a powdercoat of the main frame and a matching rattle can job for the fork, plus decals (~$60-70) is probably what you'd be looking at for best results at that price. And you will still spend at least 8 hours messing with the forks and decals.

Powdercoat jobs run about $100-150, and the best part is they take the old paint off for you by sandblasting.

amazinmets73

powdercoat sounds good to me!

Colnago Mixte

Good choice, you can get professional results with powdercoating. I did my Schwinn Paramount in "clear".


https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-v...t-project.html

amazinmets73

Bike looks amazing!

Any painters you recommend?

Colnago Mixte

You. I came back to say, you should try out some brush-on paint with that fork, you'll get more an enameled finish, as opposed to rattlecanning it, which it what I said originally.

Now if the question is, how much is it gonna cost to pay someone else to do this, I have absolutely no idea.

amazinmets73

I was afraid of that. So... How does one paint a frame?

Nessism

For $200 you could do a nice home paint job using Spraymax paint which is reasonably durable. It will take more than 8 hours though unless you are quite handy and work fast. Painting a frame is not unlike painting anything else and a search, both here and on google, will turn up more than enough info to get you started.

joesch

On very cool option of powder coating is Lumen ...

https://www.missionbicycle.com/blog/...-coat-vs-paint

The Lumen coating adds thousands of tiny spheres to the powdered pigment. Each sphere acts as a boomerang, reversing the direction of incoming light and sending it directly back to its source. The result is a bike that lights up at night with no batteries required.

I did not see the cost but nice eye candy bike site

amazinmets73

Found a guy who said he'd paint the frame for $200.

"$200,
$75 covers my materials
$125 for about 6-7hrs of labor

The clear coat they use on bicycle frames is industrial coating, very low gloss unless powder coated.
It will have a very high gloss like a sports car, due to the yellow color being under the clear, it will really stand out
I am going to use automotive clear coat on it, that's what I meant by all that"

squirtdad

my standard reply based on my limited (2 bike experience)

Unless it is really special, powder coat it

If you found a guy, find out if you have to strip the frame first and if he is not experienced with bikes you want to discuss how he will mask it....paint in bottom bracket and headset is a pain

Rattle can (as I am reminded every time I look at the first bike I painted) is way less durable than Autopaint.

In general the process is (the way I did it anyway)

remove bb and headset

chemical strip the frame 100%....any little bit of paint left will not look good. you need chemical stripper, scrapers, steel wool, brushes, rags, paper towels, rubber gloves

next make sure you have a good $40/50 ventilator mask
and a box of gloves
clean the frame with degreaser paint prep....avoid touching with bare fingers after this
mask bb and headtube

mask

Coat of Acid primer (thin really bonds to steel

Coat of sandable primer

sand smooth

tack rag to get rid of dust

3-4 thin coats of color..... paying close attention to recoat times to avoid tons of sanding. this will use way more paint than you think becuase of over spray

2-3 coats of clear againg paying close attention to recoat

have a beer or b+1

amazinmets73

amazinmets73

Hmm, had a little issue with the frame. When the clear coat was applied it caused the paint to wrinkle up on the seattube. Any idea what may have caused this?

unterhausen

are you sure you followed the directions? Last rattlecan I used said you had to shoot again within 4 hours or wait 7 days. I expect that you had an interaction between the solvent for the clear and the color coat.

Johno59

If you apply your series of coats too heavy and/or too quickly the solvent within all paint can't escape (dry off) and the trapped solvent attacks the coat below or the one above and you get the orange peel effect.
One way to avoid this is wait 24 hours and lightly sand the primer to get a key for the color coat and again for the clear. We are talking super fine paper here and most instructions don't recommend it but it does help smooth out any mistakes or weird reactions.
Oh yeah don't mix brands of primer, color or clear.