Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums Custom Corner Painting the forks

I know a lot of people have talked about stripping and polishing the forks, but what about painting them? Does that coating need to be stripped? Or can you just paint over it? Not so much worried about the little imperfections... I just think black would look better than silver.

no experience with these forks, but I would imagine the same prep work for anything professional would be required: sanding/some sort of wash (aectone)/ sanding/wash//then paint. You shouldn't need to strip them, but prep, yes. If you do it, let me know how it works out. I'd like black forks as well.

Oh I see, so at least whatever it is that is on there is prepped to take paint. Give it some tooth as it were. Makes sense! I also want to do the headlight. I have a spare one of those

i would say sand, prime, sand, paint, sand, buff. or media blast and powdercoat

Frank

She does look good!!! One more project coming.I see things like this and I can't stop messin with my blue Speed.

In an ideal world, yeah I would have them powdercoated...

The Bonnies have the lowers black, and they look great. I have priced having the whole thing done for $250. That includes tear down, powder coating the forks black, and reassembly, including the fork oil and seals and all. I just gotta figure when I want to give a up a week to do it.

Wow I REALLY have to find a powder coater around here... I can do the tear down myself. In fact, I need to replace the fork oil, I figured that would be the time to do it, ya know?

Not sure about the aluminum issue but here I use a guy that does weight lifting and exercise equipment. Thats stuff is powder coated. Not a big selection of colors from him but black is one!! LOL

The only problem so far is all the local shops I found either didn't have a web site, or looked to be on the industrial side of things. Just need to snoop around more.

sumax?

Frank

OK I found a couple places that aren't too close to home, but close to where I go for work a lot, so it's cool.

http://www.actionpowdercoat.com/main.htm
and
http://www.bigbaconpowdercoating.com/

both of which show bike and car parts. I'll have to get a couple quotes.

Call a couple of bike dealers, like the Honda dealer here knows a real good shop. Why do they? Cause they had some warranty work to get done, and the factory hooked them up with this particular crew. I bet that was the same nationwide.

Two words...POWDER COAT ! Did mine and a few other items on the bike too,,, looks great.....got mine done locally ....

My girlfriend's father does powdercoating here in LA. If anyone wanted to set it up with me, you could mail me the pieces, and i'll have him powdercoat and send the pieces back to you. he does it fairly cheap and he can do all colors including chrome. for smaller pieces it may be easy, i'm not sure for larger pieces (postage).

*an option for those who don't have powdercoating locally.

just an idea. PM me if you'd like.

thorn

thanks for the offer! I think I'll get a quote here for the forks, but I'll keep it in mind for the future.

another option......if you have lots to do is buy a powder coat sprayer,(sears) and pick up an old oven for the shop. I can't remember the sears link but under 200$.


mike

When I get a garage, I'll do that. That and a media blaster Bye bye rust, hello powder coat.

I got my pressure blaster at Harbor freight for less than $100 Don't waste your time with a siphon blaster they take forever. Also don't skimp on the powder coat equipment. The cheap ones don't magnatize well enough.

I've been keeping my eye out for used ones too. We'll see... Still gotta get the garage first.

get plenty of ceramic tips too you will eat through them fairly fast depending how much blasting you do. Don't let anyone talk you into metal tips they wear away so fast it ends up costing more than ceramic. Also don't waste money on the tip gaskets the neoprene washers for your sink faucet last much longer and work the same. This is all for the small ceramic tips for the Harborr Freight blaster.

I can also tell you how to make a great blasting cabinet out of a 55 gal. drum.

This is one thing I miss about my old job. There was a blastic cabinet literally thru a door from my desk. Loud as sim so everyone knew you were using it, but it was RIGHT there.

anyone know if the seat shown in the sample photo is avialable? i've seen it on a couple bikes now.

Is that a silencer from a standard Bonneville or did someone have a "Cherry Bomb" glass pack chrome plated?