Fuel Tank Refinishing.

It is time to start working on the CR again, I started today with the fuel tank refinishing. I had done the fenders last winter and a few weeks ago I did the shrouds and side panels.  Today I ordered the new piston kit and a new bearing for the top end, I have to save up a bit of cash to get the cylinder work done.  With any luck and some good ebay sales it wont take too long. 

The first photo is the untouched tank, you can see some of the scratches, they give off a glare in the photo.


In the second photo you can just make out the start of the finish process.
 I started with a 320 paper on this tank because the scratches were not very deep. 
Then used 400 and 600 if you decide to do this, don't make circles with the sand paper, they are harder to get out and show up easier.  Use long motions in straight lines, cross your patterns every once in a while with each grit of paper.

The third photo is also before starting at another angle to see the scratches.

This is after the 600 grit followed by two coats of clear,

 Same in this photo, after a good long cure (at least 24hrs) I will go back over the tank with 2000 grit (all sanding is done wet) then a final coat of clear.

Below are the shrouds that I refinished last week. Today I put the graphics on. Really happy with how they turned out.

 

Re-Assembly mock up

I did some clean up on the radiators, they didn't need that much so it was quick. Then I started putting some parts back on the bike.  I put the airbox, radaitors, fenders and some smaller mounting parts as well as the exhaust mounts and pipe just to take a look at how it is coming along.

Plastic Restore part 2

I know in these pictures it may be a little hard to see the scratches that I can see with it right in front of me and with the light just right, but I'm just going to pretend that you can see what I am seeing and post them anyway.













I went to work on the rear fender and the second front fender. I had already put a coat of clear on them after I sanded with the 320 so I went with the 600 grit and sanded them down.

The Finished product looks pretty nice, the front fenders (both the ones that I did) turned out very nice, the Rear on had some deep scars and I decided it was good enough for now and I will probably look for a replacement.

Plastic restore

There are a few methods that I have seen out there of restoring plastic, I have chosen to use the fusion clear coat as part of my method of choice.  Most of the methods include sanding and putting a clear of some type over the top to bring back the shine.  So that is what I am doing.  I have two front fenders to work with and I am going to start with the one that is in worse shape.  Although I think they are pretty close to being the same on the front side one of them has some rash on the back side where it was rubbing the frame.  In this photo you can see that the fender is a little dull and you can see some of the scratches in it.  I am going to start with a 120 grit emery cloth to knock down the deeper scratches and take the edges off.  The idea is to not press too hard so that you don't make more deep gashes while you are trying to clean up the ones that are already there.

Here is the fender after the 120 grit and one coat of clear.  At this point or after letting it dry for a couple hours in front of the wood stove, I will sand it again with 400 grit wet paper. 

Click on the images and you can see them enlarged.














After sanding with the 400 I realized that the jump from 120 to 400 was a bit much so it took a little longer to get the desired results with the 400 so on the next one I will do a smaller area with the 120 just on the spots that are already rough then go to a 320 to scuff the lighter scratches.

Here it is after finishing with the 400 grit, ready for another coat of clear.  Then after the clear is applied

Here at the 400 grit clear it already looks pretty good in the photo but up close you can see some sanding lines.  It is totally not necessary to be so anal about that but I am going farther.

Here after the clear dries over the 400 grit I sanded with 600 to farther remove scratches and yet another coat of clear will go on after that. Once that coat of clear is dried I will make the decision as to whether I want to go to 1000 grit paper for the super gloss coat. 

While the clear is drying on the first fender I started at the 600 grit stage I went to work on the rear fender and the other front fender.  I did as I had figured on the first one with the 120 grit I only used it to clean up spots then used the 320 to scuff out light scratches. The rear fender had some pretty deep gashes in it and they cleaned up decent with the paper and a razor blade to get some build up out of the scratches.  The blade also helps take off loose pieces of plastic that can take a very long time to sand down.  The deep scars that you can see in the rear fender will never come out but with a bit more work it will look pretty good. In this photo it is the first coat of clear at the 320 stage and already looks pretty nice. To the right is the other front fender also at the 320 stage.

I will post more on this when these parts dry and I can sand and paint again.

CR Fork Oil

Today's update is a little slim, things have slowed a bit as I wait for items on ebay to sell so I have more project money.  Actually I have paid for my project bike as of this week and I have some reserves in the account however I also have some very large (large as in expensive, tires, sprockets and chains, Piston kit) items to purchase so I have to save up a few more dollars.  Much of the cash is going toward the KX project until that one is finished. Its getting close. www.kx125project.blogspot.com .  Now on to the CR.

Here is the Oil that I took out of the forks, its a bit grey and murky.  The strange thing was when I was draining the oil it ran clean toward the end of draining and looked pretty good.  My conclusion is that it has sat for so long that the contaminates settled to the bottom.

After I drained the forks I let them sit for a couple days then took the plugs out and drained them one more time to see if any more had run to the bottom.  Then I put several ounces of solvent in and shook that around and pumped them up and down and drained that. It came out pretty dirty and gritty so I did that until the solvent was not so dirty after which I let them sit opened up at the top and bottom to dry the solvent out.  

To replace the old oil I put in 600cc of the nice green Bel-Ray Fork oil that you see in the Photo above.

Back on the Frame they go, Its starting to look like a bike again.