The Mini Pink Safari
- Thread starter legburner
- Start date
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So here she is getting ready to ride to the park. It's quite far for her as she's never done it before but to my amazement she had no problem. I have to say, and many of you fathers will attest, it's one of the greatest daddy moments ever. Thanks for all your comments and I hope this inspires all you fathers to build something for your kids.
Beautiful bike! I am truly, truly impressed!
I'm in the middle of my first build and am going to begin painting soon. I've looked through most of the how-to's on repainting frames but the paint on your project is nearly perfect. Would you mind giving a run-down of how you did it? I saw in one of the original posts that you had the parts sandblasted. I'm down to bare metal myself and am at the degrease/clean/prep stage to get things ready for primer.
-What type of primer did you use?
-How many coats?
-Did you use special automotive rattle-can paint or did you get by with standard Home Depot spray cans? Two coats? Three coats? I picked up a couple cheaper Valspar cans from Lowes this morning... Hoping they produce some nice results.
-What type of clear coat did you use? Where did you find it and ultimately how many coats did the frame need?
Thanks in advance for helping out this newb and the potential others that are wondering the same type of things.
Again- really impressed with your work!
I'm in the middle of my first build and am going to begin painting soon. I've looked through most of the how-to's on repainting frames but the paint on your project is nearly perfect. Would you mind giving a run-down of how you did it? I saw in one of the original posts that you had the parts sandblasted. I'm down to bare metal myself and am at the degrease/clean/prep stage to get things ready for primer.
-What type of primer did you use?
-How many coats?
-Did you use special automotive rattle-can paint or did you get by with standard Home Depot spray cans? Two coats? Three coats? I picked up a couple cheaper Valspar cans from Lowes this morning... Hoping they produce some nice results.
-What type of clear coat did you use? Where did you find it and ultimately how many coats did the frame need?
Thanks in advance for helping out this newb and the potential others that are wondering the same type of things.
Again- really impressed with your work!
SummitCoCycleWorks said:
My first potential mistake was not using a self etching primer. I used a flat white from rustolium and it worked ok but I think self etching would have been better. The amount of coats depends on how well the paint goes on. I also wet sand over the primer with 400. I think I put 2-3 coats of primer and about 3-4 coats of base color. It sounds like your on the right path with prep. Just need to make sure the surface is clean. I use my air compressor right before paint.
I actually used Valspar for the first time on this project because they had the pink we liked. I had to shake the crap out of it though because if I didn't I would get red splatter on the pink. As far as the clear is concerned I would stick with the same brand for both the base color and the clear. Miss matching isn't the best idea.
I also have found that recoating every 5 minutes or so works very well and produces great results. If you wait to long between coats you may wrinkle the paint. :shock: After applying base color wait 2 to 3 days minimum to apply the clear.
I'll be honest though, if I had to do it all over again I would have spent the money and had the bike powder coated. Why? Paint takes too long to dry and requires a lot of patients. The guy that did the sand blasting would have only charged me $80.00 to blast and powder coat. I spent $35 just on blasting. If you have the money it's well worth it... if you don't then rattle it.
I hope this helps. Good luck and let me know where you post your build so I can follow. Later.
