Saturday**************I had cleared pretty much the entire weekend so that I could focus on the 748. No rides, no farting around, no procrastinating... time is running thin, as are my hard liquor stores as a result of me thinking about the state of the bike and the upcoming trackday.
I got up bright and early, slammed some eggs and toast and set up my state of the art motorcycle finishing studio...
The M&M's are key to any good workday, as is the transistor radio. Country was on today with a smattering of KALX whenever they played Shania Twain.
The plastics were nearly all primed and some of them had been sanded. I finished up the last of the pieces needing primer and went over them with dry 400 grit paper. I then used a prep cloth that I'd picked up from the paint shop to degrease and remove lint and dust and shot the first coats of color. The cans didn't come with instructions and the shop didn't tell me how to apply it, so I did three coats and waited five minutes between each application. (That was how the primer directions were, so I figured they'd work with the paint.) I didn't sand between coats.
The color came out well, and I was really glad that I'd taken the time to sand down the primer coat. The primer is absolutely essential--there were a couple of spots where I'd accidentally sanded through it and the paint didn't want to cover it very well. My approach was to paint the edges and high points first, wait five minutes, give everything a once over, and then repeat that three times. Can't tell you how nice these can are--really even application, good coverage--1000X better than Krylon! Double the cost, but well worth it.
I was thinking that the color coat would be shinier and more durable than it was. Secretly I was hoping I might be able to cop out and be done after doing the color. However, I discovered that this pro paint scratched easily and some of the color would rub off with a towel. It obviously needed a clear coat, and I was really nervous about doing this. I've never had good luck with clear coat.
After I did the color coat, I sanded everything down with a 600 grit. I needed to do that wet for some reason. The paint would ball up on the paper in a second if it wasn't pretty wet. I formed a little assembly line sanding, touching up with color, and sanding again a little. Sanding with the finer grits was becoming faster and easier. I was finally ready for the clear coat.
I took the smallest piece of the bunch and experimented on it. ZOMG...it doesn't look like sh!t!!!!
This was a first for me, and a good shot of confidence. The professional clear coat stuff I bought went on like butter. I might actually be able to do this. I was still a bit disappointed that there was visible orange peel texture after all that friggen sanding, but was hoping to be able to fix that.
The last thing I wanted to do was to fill the tank with a bit of gas to make sure that the new seal I'd installed actually worked. I did that and left it, crossing my fingers for the best. And so ended Saturday.
Sunday************
I busted open a pack of M&M's and another of 1500 grit sand paper. I had checked the gas tank and not only had it not spontaneously combusted--it actually held gas. Awesomeness...so now I needed to figure out how to smooth out the clear coat a bit that I'd sprayed yesterday. I took the small piece from last night and dry sanded it. OK, that sucked. It looked like ass. So I wet-sanded it. Still assy. And then I took polishing compound to it. Mother of god...it got shiny and looked like, well, a finished paint job. I put three coats of wax on it, buffed it, and viola. I was in business. I slapped that on the bike, and was now ready to reassemble the tank.
In between putting back all the stuff that I'd forgotten I'd taken off the bike (Where does this fastener go? Uh...why do I have an extra gasket?) I clear-coated some more pieces of the body work. Once again there were no instructions. I did, however, remember to ask at the shop how to apply the stuff when I was buying it. They said one light coat and another medium-heavy. I didn't get time frames or know exactly what "medium-heavy" was supposed to be. I waited five minutes between the first light coat--I figured this helped to seal the color coat--and the medium-heavy coat. I applied the medium-heavy coat until I saw the paint start to "melt together". That's when I stopped. If I kept going it would run a little. If I did too light a coat, it would just look all "misty".
The larger pieces were a challenge, and I foresee many hours of polishing sprinkled with ample cursing in my future. Once again...a sneak peak into the state of the art facility: Amongst the piles of crap and carefully balanced in the dingy corners are my plastics. Everything has a clear coat and I can probably knock a lot of that out during the week. (Please don't hold me to that.)
And between clear coats new brake lines got installed (courtesy Enzo76) to replace the stock one that can apparently get caught on the front fender and rip out. OOOOooo shiny.
And all the little pieces that I've slowly been gathering to reassemble the tail sections are finding a home on the bike. The latch is now installed, thanks again to Enzo, who was taking a few minutes to tinker on my bike while he got his ready for track, too.
The tank is now completely assembled and--no kidding--the bike runs. It didn't blow up either. (I figure it's waiting for me to take it around the block after it's all painted to blow up.) And, yes, those are new tires. MichaelMoore picked them up at a trackday, and since he borrowed my truck to go to the track, they got delivered right to my house with the return of the pick-up. :thumbup
So at the end of the weekend, the bike runs but the seat isn't attached quite yet--waiting for paint to dry. I have new grips, new tires, new brake lines, all the fluids are in good shape, and I have new spark plugs. I need to sand/polish all the bodywork and finish attaching the seat. I've spent quite a bit of time during the weekday evenings cleaning and checking little things out. I had a few minutes to kill waiting for coats to dry and even scraped all the old wheel weight goop off the rear tire (discovered my weights weren't taped back there, so I did that). It looks so good that I have to do the front wheel now too. :rolleyes
I'm a little ahead of where I planned to be--does that *ever* happen? Next weekend I'll take the bike around the block and see how she purrs. I'll have enough time to apply a few decals, maybe get some numbers on her, and spend an hour huffing Goo to remove the old wheel weight crud off the front wheel. (Still waiting for something to blow up.)
