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Louis K
11-26-2004, 12:44 AM
This is a step by step process that will help you paint your frame and parts the beautiful color you we're looking for! This will tell you every detail of what you should do if you want a bright, really nice colored bike!

To paint your frame!

Materials:

-2 cans of your selected color spray paint, for richer and long lasting color that won't flake off, buy a can of paint that has it being used on a car or something that is outside!! Make sure it says water resistant = $12
-A pack of steel wool (the color should be silver, not bronze or gold) = $3
-A pack of large sandpaper (the medium material so its not too rough) = $5
-2 cans of clear coat = $12
-1 can of primer! - $5
-x2 Metal clothes hangers - In your basement or ask your mom for free = $0
Total: $37

Step 1: Strip your bike down to nothing! Remove every part, all you want if the frame naked!
Step 2: Put a rag inside your insterrior tube (where you put your forks and headset in!) And put a rag inside your bottom bracket and inside where you put your seat post in.
Step 3: Put masking tape over the rags so when you spraypaint none of the paint gets inside of them, because if it does then your parts won't work to the maxium of their ability!
Step 4: Use the steel wool to remove any of the dirt/ greese you have on your bike, even if you don't see any still do it anyway :)
Step 5: Use the sand paper and make sure you make your paint job right now looks raw and dull! Thats what you want! Make it look like it has alot of scratches in it! Thats what you want so the next step works!! (Make sure you get where the welds are, and under the top tube and all of that really good, you want to get it everywhere with sandpaper!)
Step 6: Get 2 metal clothes hangers, break them so its 1 long piece of metal, then bent them so both ends meet, then put 1 hanger inside where you put the rag inside of your rag in your sterrior tube, and put one of the clothes hangers inside your bottom bracket. Find a good tree with a sturdy branch (so your frame doesn't fall down while your painting it!) and hang your frame up on it!
Step 7: When you have the frame a nice raw and ugly metal scratched color you can spray a light coat of the primer on it, put your hand over the can of spray paint, use your pointer finger over the trigger of the paint can and push it down for a half of second, then with a "side by side" motion spray light strokes on your frame (Hold the can 6 inches from the frame when your spraying so no drips happen if its too close!). Let it dry for 1 hour and then repeat again with a little bit more of it. (NOTE: Make sure you avoid runs! If any runs do occur, wait for it to dry, then sand down that area and put a light coat of primer over it.)
Step 8: After you waited for an hour so the last coat of primer dryed, then apply a thin coat of your colored spray paint the same way you did to put the primer on. Make sure you get everywhere!
Step 9: Wait 30 minutes then paint your frame once again with the colored spray paint. This time a little bit thicker, so that you can't see the primer anymore! Wait another 30 minutes and do this atleast 2 more times! (NOTE: Make sure you avoid runs! If any runs do occur, wait for it to dry, then sand down that area and put a light coat of paint over it again.)
Step 10: After your frame has a rich color, then use your clear coat. Use it the same way you did to paint your frame. Do atleast 3 layers of clear coat waiting the amount of time needed on the back of the can so you don't get any runs. You can do more than 3 layers of it, remember, the more you do, the more your bikes paint job will look nicer and it will last longer!
Step 11: Regrease all of your parts, and put them all back in the same way you took them out. This will also make your bike work alot better!!

Well their you go. The more you let the primer, paint, and clear coat set, the more your paint will last and the shiner it will be! For the best performance of your paintjob, you should let your frame sit for atleast 2 weeks (so that it is FOR-SURE dry. Remember, when you paint a car it takes atleast a month for all the paint to dry, so if you want a nice job you need patients! This stuff won't dry overnight!). I bet you it will not chip at all :)

If you want to paint your bars, forks, seat post, stem, brakes, or cranks, or spokes. Do the same steps as above!

I hope this helps anyone who is looking to paint their bike parts! I definetly tryed my best on this article :)

Street Cowboy
11-26-2004, 01:24 AM
great artical dude. i just wanna add that you should be extreamly carefull when doing your clearcoats. if it drips and you sand it down . where you have sanded will reflect light differently and cuase a hazy or smuged look.

you can also go furtur by first adding an anti rust coating under the primer straight on the metal.

Louis K
11-26-2004, 01:47 AM
Thanks alot Street :) Yes you definetly have to be very careful with that clearcoat. :)

drk_fly
11-26-2004, 04:00 AM
some pictures would be nice.. of the final result or some crap like that

Louis K
11-26-2004, 05:31 AM
I can't get any pictures, its winter here now, i'm painting my neighbors bike though, its finished but I can't put the clear coat I got on it until after january because the weather has to be a certain degrees. :twisted:

stolen_rider
11-26-2004, 01:05 PM
man that was a great article, makes me wanna go and paint something :P

Rasta04
11-26-2004, 06:49 PM
nice article. lol, stolen, i was thinking that. im gonna go paint my cat or something.

WeThePeople
11-26-2004, 06:58 PM
excellent article man

reyesjr02
11-26-2004, 09:32 PM
im thinking about painting my bike now.....good article

drk_fly
11-26-2004, 09:49 PM
nice article. lol, stolen, i was thinking that. im gonna go paint my cat or something.

hahah lol.

mshbiker31390
11-27-2004, 12:16 AM
i painted my forks with this info thanks a lot. i would sudjest that instead of painting like 2-3 coats of paint that you do like 15, but they are a lot thinner, so you get the same affect. it makes the paint a LOT less likely to chip or w/e. Great article

Louis K
11-27-2004, 12:41 AM
Wow did you do the 15 coats? LOL I bet it will turn out great! Are you going to use clear coat? if so your bars will look so nice! :)

I painted my bars today, I made a custom color, black/ red, I made alot of drips on it on purpose and I did only 1 large coat. I did it so my bars look unique and I think they look badass. :)

paddyboy
11-27-2004, 12:54 AM
get some pics of how your bars turned out

Louis K
11-27-2004, 12:56 AM
Yes I will. I am putting them back on my bike tomorrow and then putting everything on them (grips and brake lever) and then ill take pics :)

Louis K
11-27-2004, 01:34 AM
Go here to see the pictures of my bars:

http://www.bmx-forum.com/viewtopic.php?p=165390

reyesjr02
11-27-2004, 04:02 AM
whatever floats your boat..... :roll:

Louis K
11-27-2004, 04:06 AM
Yeah they did come out pretty crappy but noone else has them! :lol:

Street Cowboy
11-27-2004, 10:06 PM
why didnt you follow your own instructions?? i didn't think you could make that bike look any uglyer. you proved me wrong. congradulations you have the uglyest bike i have ever seen. and for that one reason i like it all that much more.

future referance if you want two toned anything .. start with your light colour. then use your dark. and for bars like that use tape to create the line between the two colours.

Louis K
11-27-2004, 10:08 PM
I didn't follow my instructions because:

1.) Low on paint
2.) Its too cold out to make the paint look nice.

But today I repainted the bars, all a really nice black color. :)

Raptor
11-27-2004, 10:11 PM
Huh? It's too cold to paint your bars the right way?

Louis K
11-27-2004, 10:14 PM
Yes, even if I tryed it wouldn't dry the right way for weeks.

drk_fly
11-27-2004, 10:56 PM
lol u sed the two tone was nice.... now the black?? lol jks (i think? :roll: ) ya.

Graphite
11-28-2004, 01:39 AM
Thanks for the write up, I was looking to change the color of my frame pretty soon.

Louis K
01-07-2005, 01:09 AM
Bumping this so new people can see it :)

Matthew
01-08-2005, 02:13 PM
can u repost the pic of the bars, i wanna c how they turned out but u took em off the other post :?

Louis K
01-08-2005, 07:39 PM
Nah man they sucked thats why I took them off. They we're so ugly. Just follow my instructions and everything will turn out right I didn't follow my steps because of lack of paint and the bad weather wouldn't let it dry.

Dakwota
01-08-2005, 11:25 PM
great article man!
What do you mean by using the tape over the b/b and seat post etc...?

Louis K
01-09-2005, 12:39 AM
When you put the tape/ rags in them, paint can't get into them :) If theirs no paint in them it will last longer :)

Louis K
02-12-2005, 10:07 PM
Could a mod please sticky this??

Dakwota
02-28-2005, 09:48 AM
but on the head tube and the bb there'll be stripes were the sticly tape was?

nutsgeezer
02-28-2005, 04:04 PM
Could a mod please sticky this??no, sorry. I know it is an article people should read before painting their bike, but if we stickied every article like this the whole first page would be stickies.

Louis K
02-28-2005, 05:20 PM
Yeah I would have to agree. Thanks anyway!

mshbiker31390
03-01-2005, 08:22 PM
i just found one of those air sprayguns that they use to paint cars and things in my garage, its brand new, now all i need is a compressor, paint, and then i can paint my parts "professionally" i am so stoked, i can't wait, because now i can do some really cool paint schemes, wohoo!!!!

slaze
05-03-2005, 07:39 PM
that will b good for paintin ur bike

Shane472
05-11-2005, 04:35 AM
I'm going to paint my bike this winter. Nothing to do when it's too cold to go out and ride and there's stupid snow on the ground.

bob-14
05-30-2005, 10:20 PM
37 for one paint?
just buy color and spray it good color about 8$

Matthew
06-03-2005, 02:08 PM
Hey louis, ive just started painting my tramp bikes frame (pearlescent black) using this tips, its looking good so far...

Louis K
06-05-2005, 02:09 AM
Thats awesome! Show me some pics when your done!!

Matthew
06-09-2005, 10:04 PM
I got the frame painted and padded now, i think it went ok for my first painting attempt, except the frame fell over before it was dry so it has a few smudges on it :doh: , but ive covered them up with stickers :dance:

Im getting my tramp soon aswell, so its not all bad :P

Louis K
06-10-2005, 11:15 PM
I got the frame painted and padded now, i think it went ok for my first painting attempt, except the frame fell over before it was dry so it has a few smudges on it :doh: , but ive covered them up with stickers :dance:

Im getting my tramp soon aswell, so its not all bad :P


Yeah that happened to me before. It sucks :x But glad it worked out well! Let it settle for like a week to fully harden and you will be set!

i_have_a_bike
06-12-2005, 01:59 AM
dang. i painted my sweet redline race bike black with one coat of dollar general black and the forks pink krylon. and they are chipping. darn what a loss.

Darkdevil_John
08-27-2005, 09:58 PM
Thanks for this great article I plan on buying a Fly Micromachine frame and since they dont sell em in the color I want I was gonna repaint it myself.

mooK
08-31-2005, 06:24 PM
woop i got teh chance to do it this week, i decided jus to go black :)

Frame before:
http://accessroot.net/jamie/dirtcakez/bike1.gif

Frame with primer:
http://accessroot.net/jamie/dirtcakez/bike2.gif

Frame painted:
http://accessroot.net/jamie/dirtcakez/bike3.gif

Bike back together (other than brake cable cuz i need a new one) :
http://accessroot.net/jamie/dirtcakez/bike4.gif


:D comments?

Matrix
11-10-2005, 09:49 AM
Step 7: When you have the frame a nice raw and ugly metal scratched color you can spray a light coat of the primer on it, put your hand over the can of spray paint, use your pointer finger over the trigger of the paint can and push it down for a half of second, then with a "side by side" motion spray light strokes on your frame (Hold the can 6 inches from the frame when your spraying so no drips happen if its too close!). Let it dry for 1 hour and then repeat again with a little bit more of it. (NOTE: Make sure you avoid runs! If any runs do occur, wait for it to dry, then sand down that area and put a light coat of primer over it.)

Side to side...CAUSES RUNS :!: :!: :!:

You paint up-down...ALWAYS, watch them paint a car...side side starting away from it, finishing AFTER!

Not as easy with a can of paint(want runs...spay side to side)...want smooth?

Start 3inches or so ABOVE the frame and work down. NEVER remove your finger from the can till you pass the bottom of the frame by 3inches.

Thats from headtube to bottom bracket...or the other way around.

ALSO, don't use a rag...TAPE off the BB, head tube and seat tube.

Damn, are you 10? That will **** up a frame...read a book on it and learn. I CAN NOT belive someone belived this is a good way to paint a bike.

Also, get AIRCRAFT stripper, because you want the frame 99.9999% RAW...just roughing it up the paint will not last as long

Louis K
11-11-2005, 04:07 AM
Damn, are you 10? That will f*ck up a frame...read a book on it and learn. I CAN NOT belive someone belived this is a good way to paint a bike.

have you ever tried my way? If so, you will see how it comes out. I bet atleast 100 people did it my way so far and each of them came out atleast good. So suck it :P

Matrix
11-11-2005, 04:14 AM
Damn, are you 10? That will f*ck up a frame...read a book on it and learn. I CAN NOT belive someone belived this is a good way to paint a bike.

have you ever tried my way? If so, you will see how it comes out. I bet atleast 100 people did it my way so far and each of them came out atleast good. So suck it :P

No, never WOULD try it that way...seen enough clumped paint to know better. If you do it right, all 100 would be close to factory look.

Their is a reason for painting a part WITH the grain, not aginst it.

BMXMB
12-07-2006, 04:05 PM
I miss the photo's..

Scottehrm
12-07-2006, 04:36 PM
good article man... i was gonna make on of these threads on how to paint ur stuff right tomorrow.. im sandin my frame...

traer
12-10-2006, 04:50 AM
i just recently sprayed my frame, the problem is that i want to change the colour again lol, it's only been a couple months

gcfchas
12-11-2006, 03:53 AM
im painting my cat right now...she looks great!!

good article.

my cats all scratchin and hissin....but she knows she gonna look good.

p.s. this is a post for painting cats right?