Ducati Monster Forum

As much as I love my new/used Italian Monster S2R8....I've always had a love for German made HK firearms. Built most of them from scratch to milspec. All US compliant to my local laws. Well, most of my rifles were sold as butt ugly gray rifles, so that they don't look to tactical and import much easier into the US. An easy trick was to dye the gray rifles so that the color is permanently changed to a beautiful satin black finish. The color gets deep enough that scratches are still black. Better than any plastic paint.

So examining my S2R's belt covers and realizing that it's a plastic heat resistant material (similar to the HK's Nylon-66) a carbon polymer composite.  I figure I'd try the dye method.

- Thoroughly scrub your covers with degreaser. Rinse them with soap and warm water. If you don't get all the grease out, it'll leave a stain. Degrease it more if you're not sure.
- Take a 5 gallon bucket = $5 at HomeDepot. (You can also use a large waterproof tray, old cooler, or something that you can cover your parts in)
- Boil a few pots of water. I did this in my basement on an electric stove using two 2-gallon pots at the same time. Get them up to boil and keep poring them into the bucket till it's a couple inches from the rim. If you have to wait to boil more water, just keep a lid on the bucket. The hotter, the better the penetration.
- You'll need 4 bottles of  liquid Rit Dye = $12  (3 black / 1 dark green) NOTE: Don't buy the powder dye. This quantity is what you need for a 5 gallon mix.
- Shake up the dyes and pore them in...stir for a min.
- Hang your covers with wire, hanger, phone line, no clamps. Dip them into the dye. Lift them up and down to ensure there are no bubbles.
- Put the lid on and wrap the bucket with an old winter coat or thick blanket. I used an ugly coat I got from my monster-in-law a few Christmases ago.
- I usually let my dye jobs sit over night (5-8 hrs). When it's time, open the lid, the water will be very warm to pretty hot.
- You'll pull them out and see a tint of purple. No worries. Rinse them out in warm water and rub them down real good with a rag and WD40.

I wanted to post pics of this but I just did it last night and they turned out perfect. A nice dark flat black. I'll post pics tonight.

For now these are how some of my firearms turned out. Sorry if you are an anti-gun person. I come from a military/police family. So we love firearms.

Before dye:
(http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm157/HKforFREEDOM/HKs/SL8-1_lower-forearm.jpg)

After milling, plastic welding, and the dye job:
(http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm157/HKforFREEDOM/HKs/photo3.jpg)

(http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm157/HKforFREEDOM/HKs/PSG8_G36.jpg)

Sorry if this was posted before.

You're going to fit in well here

Nice write-up.  Those HKs came out sweet.  They should definitely also be posted here: http://www.ducatimonsterforum.org/index.php?topic=25903.0 (http://www.ducatimonsterforum.org/index.php?topic=25903.0)

I have also read that adding salt to the RIT dye mixture will help the dye penetrate the plastic even more.  Is there any truth to that?

The HK's look good!    [thumbsup]

Please post pics of the finished covers. The HK whatever it is looks very cool.

lol

So why the 3 parts black one part dark green?

dark green is secretly...

more blacker

Thanks all. Glad to see there are some others who love to shoot as well as ride on here.

Here's a pic with the camera phone. The dark green does help to get a deeper black. And the yellow properties of the green help to negate the purplish tints that come from lots of black dye. You will still see a bit of dark purple in your mixture, and even a tint of it when you pull your parts out. (There's no sicker feeling than pulling out your firearm receiver thinking you'll be showing up to the range with a purple gun.) But a good rinse in warm water and a WD40 rub down will take care of all that. If you still see a hint of purple, rubbing alcohol works great too.

(http://i295.photobucket.com/albums/mm157/HKforFREEDOM/Bike%20Stuff/photo.jpg)

Those looks good.
Right now my covers have vinyl paint on them.  Some of that has come off from taking them on and off several times. Do you think a good strip job would be enough and then I could dye them? 

I thought about dying them 4 years ago  but just could not find someone that had success in it.  Now seeing all this I really want to try it. Thank you.

It's totally doable. My friend had a rifle that a previous owner painted with GunCote or something. It was pretty scratched up. So we sanded it off and wet sanded it smooth to get the swirls out. It came out great. I'm sure vinyl paint should be easier to strip. Maybe use some type of paint remover/stripper first. Sorry, I'm not to familiar with vinyl paint. Good luck!

I wanted to say thanks to forFREEDOM for the great instructions on this.  My belt covers and sprocket guard came out looking like OEM plastic parts.  Truly, it is ridiculous how good this stuff looks.  Here are some pics. 

Now I've got much more to fix up on the bike to bring it to the level of these plastic bits.  Who knew I'd be saying that.  Cheers forFREEDOM [thumbsup]

(http://i298.photobucket.com/albums/mm244/csorin/Motorcycle/DSC_3401.jpg)

(http://i298.photobucket.com/albums/mm244/csorin/Motorcycle/DSC_3417.jpg)

(http://i298.photobucket.com/albums/mm244/csorin/Motorcycle/DSC_3430.jpg)

(http://i298.photobucket.com/albums/mm244/csorin/Motorcycle/DSC_3433.jpg)

That looks great, csorin! Wish I remembered to do the sprocket guard like you. To bad there are more bits that need powder coating than an easy dye job.

Looks simply awesome. Im kinda wondering about the durability of this dye. Anyone have any complaints so far?

It's as durable as the polymer itself. The heat helps the dye soak into the material. It's now permanently black. Minor scratches won't show up unless you gouge it some how. On one rifle that was already dyed, I decided to mod it by cutting off the stock to add another one. It looked like the dye soaked in about .5mm into the plastic. Of couse I dropped it back into the dye bucket when I was done.

Insane. Ill be doing this. Nice write up.

nicely done.  I'm going to give that a shot on the wife's bike  [thumbsup]

Very nice, and thanks for the write-up. 

Cool guns. 

+11tyb to everything mentioned above.

I always thought RIT dye was for clothing and tie-dying hippies ;D

i've never tie-dyed a hippy, but that sounds fun as long as you wash them first

[laugh] [laugh] [laugh] [laugh]

How hard is it to degrease the belt covers, especially if they are really dirty and permeated w/ grease. Is it more about making sure the grease near the surface (where the dye will penetrate) is gone, or getting them reslly purged of all grease whatsoever. My covers are off right now for my oil/filter/belt change /valve service, so soing this right now would be perfect, and I have the dark monster and this would look great.

The Doc

I first wiped mine down thoroughly with WD-40 brake cleaner.  This cleaned 95% of the dirt/grease off.  Just keep wiping them down until you aren't moving around dark streaks.  Then went to the sink and used both mechanic's soap and dish soap to finish the job.

Thanks, I went Degreaser, liquid dish soap, then mechanic's orange pumice hand soap. cleaned 'til they looked practically new, then cleaned a bit more, dried off. Then cleaned a bit more until I realized the streaks I was trying to get off were dark line left by the trellis frame casting a shadow across the covers while the bike sat out in the sun and they faded a bit. So I stopped cleaning. They are now brewing.

I used a combo 5-gallon bucket inside an old garbage can that I had. This way I could lay down a towel in the bottom under the bucket, line around the bucket with towels, and then when the brew was all set to stew for a while, cover the top with more towels, and then pop the lid of the garbage can on top to keep more heat on. This also allowed me to do it inside in the kitchen and not stink up the house, or worry about my two year-old (read 'curious') mess with it and spill scalding water all over himself, or his 5 month old sister. Plus the whole thing will help to keep the heat in; putting it outside wouldn't have worked as it is currently about 25 degrees outside.

The Doc

Doc! You can never be too clean, bro! You should be good to go on your setup. Can't wait to see how they turn out.

Have any pictures Doc?

forFREEDOM... in your first post you said you could use a cooler.  Like a Coleman or Igloo cooler?

If you use a cooler, Heath, you may want to use a large plastic trash bag inside. 

Yeah Heath... An old cooler would be ideal because they keep in the heat really well. And then you can wheel it away and unplug it. If you still want to use it, you can. It'll just be dark grayish/black inside.  [drink]

Battlecry...The trash bag liner is a great idea. Maybe line 3 or 4 and then you can just lift it all out and discard it easily.

Okay, here we go, pics as requested:

This is my set-up first (minus the insulating towels which have been removed.
(http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs1227.snc4/155971_1752415655044_1378494892_1924247_2800231_n.jpg)
(http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs607.ash2/155971_1752415535041_1378494892_1924244_5393757_n.jpg)

Here you can see the space around the bucket that I filled with "old nasty towels" as my wife calls them, I keep them in my shop for cleaning up spills and other things like this that would get me killed if I used good towels. I used the towels under, around, and on top of the bucket to keep it all warm and toasty. The towels are also good for making a path to the sink so that when you spill it goes in the towels and not your wife's kitchen floor.
(http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs1227.snc4/155971_1752415615043_1378494892_1924246_8106718_n.jpg)

I pulled one cover out after about 8 hours, rinsed it off, dried it and found out it was dark grey, so it went back in the bucket with the others for another 8 hours or so. Next time they came out they were nice and dark black, so if you pull yours out and they aren't dark enough, just stick'em back in and let them simmer for a while longer.

Here are mine after about 16-18 hours, cleaned off, dried, and them wiped down with good old WD-40.
(http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs607.ash2/155971_1752415575042_1378494892_1924245_6632899_n.jpg)

Since I was taking pictures my son decided that he needed to have his picture taken too, so here he is.
(http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash2/hs613.ash2/156594_1752417895100_1378494892_1924249_5613067_n.jpg)

Let me know if you have any questions. This turned out great!!. I will thry to post up pictures when I get them back on the bike, but that might not be for a while since it is Thanksgiving weekend, and I have to finish the valve service before these go back on too. Thankfully I just put a wall heater i9n my shop, so it will be above freezing when I get out there again.

The Doc

Happy Thanksgiving, Fellas!

Nice job, Doc! Good setup for doing it in the house. Thanks for posting pics too. Also a good tip regarding putting them back in if not dark enough.

What year and model Monster do you have? I'm wondering if it needed to soak longer because the material is an older, more dense composite. Or maybe the water didn't come to a full boil when you pored it in? Did it still seem pretty hot after 8 hrs? Regardless, the pieces look awesome!

I did mine in my basement. I boiled two deep pots of water at the same time which equaled almost 4 gallons. Immediately, I boiled another pot to finish it off. I too insulated it under the bucket and fully wrapped it. Wish I thought of the garbage can idea too. That would help to contain any minor accidents.

BTW Doc, good looking boy. Mine is about the same age and has the exact same outfit.  [beer]

...(thread jack) Hmmmm...I wonder how well this would work on my fading Jeep fenders and bumper end caps??? (end thread jack)...

No idea, give it a shot. Worst effect is they look a bit darker, you're just going to need a big cooler and more dye. Oh, and lots of degreaser and soap. Remember that my covers came out a tiny bit uneven because of the sun fading and their age. The sun actually causes the chemical compound to break down slightly, so they stained a tiny bit different where there was a shadow from the trellis frame, however there probably are not many inconsistencies in the color of your fenders as there isn't anything casting a long-term shadow on them while they are in the sun.
Basically you need a slightly permeable plastic that is heat resistant enough that boiling water will not deform it, and I think you will be okay. Most of this is just my guessing, but hey you have to decide in the end if you want to do it anyway.

The Doc

Or those of us with older German cars with the plastic gray/black bumpers.

My covers are soaking.  Keep your fingers crossed

done!  looks great....keep the cheap ideas coming.  :)
(http://i433.photobucket.com/albums/qq53/montey2005/beltcovers.jpg)

Hey Pip. Not sure about those bumpers taking on the dye. I've tried other nylons and plastics with no luck. Sometimes when I have an old favorite baseball cap that's faded, I drop it into the bucket cold. Come back a day later, and I have a fresh black cap. What I noticed, some embroidery threads won't change color. Some white will turn silver and some colors turn grayish, but after washing it out, the threads go back to their original color.

On an older car, you might want to find out if the plastic is ABS or some very hard material. If it feels soft, it could have some nylon that might take in a dye bath.

Way to go, muskrat! Looks great!

Thank you for the idea  ;D
Wife called me at 6 this morning to say they looked great.  Of course, this was way before I even think about getting up.  [bang]

(http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6203/6090233151_dbaee6ef76.jpg)


any ideas about this?

I want to dye it with the belt covers, but not sure.
previous owner debadge it, not sure what I should do before the dye job???
 [beer]

Not livin' up to your screen name, huh?   ;D

I would try a fine grit wet-sanding.  If it looks good after that, cool.  If not Krylon plastic spray paint....the side covers ARE plastic right...?

Yeah pretty sure I am wet sanding then dunking it!



come for a ride.

How'd you go?

Not there yet. good weather = riding a lot.

I had very mixed results doing mine.  The sprocket cover and indicators worked really well.  Belt covers were pretty good.

However the side panels and beer tray were dreadful - I got this weird silver blooming all over them, especially on the beer tray.

Here's my best and worst piece side by side after dyeing, for comparison.

(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-z-K4qEjk-9g/TnKOgV8jQiI/AAAAAAAAAeM/xlP-8w2FV6s/s640/Ducati%252520bits%252520008.jpg)

The beer tray was pretty black beforehand - perhaps a teeny bit faded, but nothing like this.

My concourse plans are well and truly stuffed now.

I know, I know....holy thread revival, Batman!  Well it may be old, but it's good! 

I want to dye my belt covers black.  I didn't re-read the thread before buying the dye and didn't remember that liquid dye was recommended.  Since I am now the not so proud owner of several packages of black and one package of green RIT powder dye, I'm wondering if anybody tried to use powder and how were your results?  Is there a specific reason why the liquid product would work better?

I well let the OP answer why he says use liquid but here is a quote from the rit site.

Thanks, Heath.  That certainly splains a bit.

Did you strip the paint from your covers and dye them?  How did they turn out?

I still need to strip my covers and dye them.  I have the dye but life has been a little hectic lately.  I also want to cut up my covers but not exactly sure what what I want to do.