Frame painting and stripping paint from swing arm

[mike rasponi]

okay i have a '99 KX250 and i and i want to do two things, A: i want to strip the paint from the swing arm and have it polished to a shine. what would this cost me? what would it require me doing? do any of you know were i can have this done? Does it need to have a type of sealent or paint applied to the metal after it is stripped? oh and the other question is, to paint the frame would i need to remove the engine? im thinking a nice YZ blue paint for my frame, polish the swing arm should match my chrome PC pipe nicley and the all black plastics should top it off

 

[ZOOK250]

strip the whole bike down. take out every thing.get the frame sand blasted,and then powder coat it. coating around here is 75.00 canadian so thats about 35 bucks in u.s funds, about 20 bucks to get it sandblasted. believe me , ive done every frame on my bikes and paint does not hold up. powder coating is 10 times more durable. check out my rm frame in the member gallery.

 

[Kaw_Boy_5]

The swingarm polish is really cheap and easy. Just sand it smooth with aroung 400 grit wet sandpaper and then I used an aluminum polish to get a beauty of a shine. Don't mean to question your tastes but a YZ blue frame on a KX? I picture a very ugly beast.

 

[mike rasponi]

i decided to not get the frame powder coated, but i am going to get the swing arm polished, i have a polisher, but what is "wet" sandpaper? how much labor would his be? would it be easier o just have the swing arm bead blasted or sand blasted?

 

[orion163]

Originally posted by mike rasponi
but what is "wet" sandpaper?

your kidding right?

 

[MikeT]

wet sandpaper is sandpaper you dip in water and sand whatever you are sanding, wet. The water keeps the paper from loading up with the dust you just sanded off. Works really well. If you rey this with regular sandpaper, all the "sand" will come off and the paper will tear up.

 

[mike rasponi]

thank you mikeT for explaining that to me

 

[Senior KX Rider]

On a KX, the paint on the swingarm is very soft . All you need is a can of aircraft paint stripper from Wall mart. Put the stripper on leave set and take a stiff wire brush and brush the pain off, rinse with water and you are ready to polish. If you gan get a high speed polisher you do not need to wetsand. Just start out with a coarse compound, buff a couple times to remove the sanding scratches that will be in the aluminum and then buff witha fine polish to make it look like chrome. I have done a bunch of them, really is easy if you have the right stuff :)

 

[Senior KX Rider]

I can do one start to finish in about 30 minutes

 

[Hucker]

I just finished polishing my swingarm and 400grit is way to harsh if you want to get a shine out of it. I used 600, then 800, then 1000, then 1500, then finally finished with 2000 grit. It looks like a mirror. I guess it all depends on what you want it to look like when its finished. Wet sanding is just using the sand paper when its wet, nothing to it. Plus when your using the high grits, the water helps get rid of the removed aluminum, so your not gouging the smooth surface with the tiny little aluminum particles. I'd then apply some clear coat so your finish isn't all ruined the first day you go out :) Good luck.

 

[KXKen]

If you go with blasting don't use sand use a plastic type media or something like Walnut shells. I've been told by a couple of different people that do powder coating not to use sand.

 

[demographic]

Hucker. What type/brand clear coat are you planning to use cos there is a bloke on visordown.com that is wanting to do his swingarm and needs a few more pointers. Cheers :D

 

[joebush]

mothers gold ''aluminum''polish or ''never dull'' will polish up nicely