Monark II fork problem. Hopefully solving with Plasti Dip

justride · Jan 24, 2014

So I got these Monark II forks for my daughter's bike. The frame she has is a postwar DX that I lovingly painted pink and black for her. Then I put on the Monark II forks, and while it wasn't the best handling bike in the world, it sure looks cool.

Well, fast forward a bit, and her bike fell over in the garage, and the giant steel blade that they call a "top bracket" dug into the pink paint. Needless to say I was ticked off. This is what the slayer of paint looks like.

The edges are sharp enough to slice cheese. I figured there were two ways to deal with it - either grind it down and repaint it, or I could lay down thick coating of Plasti Dip. It's laying down quite well - which was a bit surprising. I'm about seven coats in, and it's starting to build up nicely. Once I put a few more coats on, I will post a pic. Hoping this solves the problem for me...

mikeeebikey · Jan 25, 2014

I put a piece of velcro around the frame on springer bikes to protect the paint, and hide the scratch....

justride · Jan 25, 2014

Well, after many, many coats of PlastiDip, I officially called it good.

The PlastiDip is pretty cool stuff. It went on pretty smoothly, and kinda leveled itself out between coats. You can't really tell it's not paint. I tested it against a frame I didn't care about, and it seemed to hold up and didn't chip the paint.

It reinstalled easily, too. and now "Pinkie" is a roller.