james caruso
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nex, it has always been recommended by spi anyway to do solvent first then water. in most cases anyway, i usually only use solvent initally before the first sanding of a part anyway. once the primer goes on its all water from that point.
my makita has been runnin for about 8 years now and it has buffed every single part, piece and car that has come out of my shop in that time. its still rockin without a problem. sometimes it will run almost non stop all day long. for the power its extremely light, much more than a dewalt or anything else out there other than the mini one from flex.
i personaly haven’t used the 909. i usually use the 903. it flashes pretty quick since its mostly alcohol. i wouldn’t call it waterbased but its not exactly solvent either.
yup a metallic pink/magenta. the crimson code i gave you should be in the ballpark. you can lighten or darken from there. i have seen from the factory color put right on top of metal before. its really no big deal. i’ve never seen it flaking or peeling so it must just be some type of one step stuff to cut cost. let me know how it goes!!
ding, you can tweak that red a little. by making the base color darker you will make the candy look darker when the lights are off of it. by putting less coats of candy you will make it lighter or brighter when the lights are on it. i can almost guarantee that kawi didn’t put a gold down under the candy. it was probably more like a metallic magenta or something like that. with the base color in the same family as the candy they can get away with only one or two coats of candy over it and still get the red they want. candies from the bike companies usually look good but dont have the depth of one you or i would do because of it. if you have a carizzma book look up a color called light crimson, its code 309. you can plug that code into smarttrack. you’ll probably have to mess with the matallics in it but its probably a good place to start anyway. alot of time if you look at the bace of one of the factory pieces you can sometimes see what the base color is. there might be a spot where the candy didn’t cover….or you can sand and feather some of the oem paint out and look at the layers that way.
keep in mind waterbased clearner take ALOT longer to flash off than solvent based. i have been told once you wipe down with a waterbased clear the part needs to sit for 1/2hour to get the water out of any pores. it may look dry but in fact it isn’t. i used to get that problem on metal when i was going to epoxy. once i started waiting a little longer the problem went away.
just some pricing info for you jimmo……i do alot of stuff like that as well as my buddy who has a powdercoat shop who does 1-4 sets of wheels like that a day. both him and i would get about $140-$180 per wheel. of course that would be for both colors but still, it only takes 15 min to shoot the background color. your price is really reasonable and you should probably get more. i know if someone brought me in a set of wheels with the tires already off and just wanted them scuffed and shot a different color i would be $100 a wheel….easy and thats pretty cheap. i have custom car shops around here that i do work for that mark that up 100%. i looked up the invoice for the wheels i posted the pic of and to do those 2 wheels ran $600 and it was for one of my dealers who i usually cut a little break.
you’ll find that many of the motorcycle colors are actual true dye based candies like hok. they are usually over a similar or lighter version of the candy color though so they can get away with less coats. colors like this you wont find anything close in your colormax chips. you would find something closer in a carizzma book. the candy red has a paint code of 665C. the bronze has no code and finding motorcycle colors in smarttrack is like finding a needle in a haystack. most have no code, no year and just a generic name. they are just a formula sitting there basically useless to everyone. the bronze, assuming its just a metallic, you are going to have to find the closest colormax formula and tweak it from there. the colors are available from color-rite but if you have never used it their matches suck and so does the paint. your better off doing it by eye.
the pva is your mold release agent. you gotta use that otherwise everything will bond to tthe mold. the epoxy stuff you have might make a nice flexible piece similar to original moldings…… as long as its not like putty and it will flow out in the mold. try it out, whats the worse that could happen. its such a small piece that your not losing much time or materials if it doesn’t work. trial and error is how you learn. :cheer:
gelcoat gets reduced with acetone. dont thin it too much. you dont want it watery. thinned just enough to get it to spit out of the 2.3 is fine. rememeber it doesn’t have to go in the mold looking good since you wont see that side. for future, one other thing you can do is if your laying up a part that will be painted is skip the gelcoat and use polyester primer. i have used featherfill g2 plenty of times in a mold. sands easier too. pop the part, sand it and its ready to go!!
yes, mix up the gel. you can reduce it a little with some acetone if you need to then spray a few coats into the mold. let the gel get atleast thick and sticky between coats. let it kick off overnight and you are ready to go for the glass.
nex, you did a nice job with everything, i was just giving you some info for future projects. as for this piece, what you want to do is your call. its one of those things, it may and probably will be fine and completely outlive the car or it might crack the day after you give it to the person…who knows. tough call. i guess if there was a problem with it down the road you could always just make a new one then.
if your just doing a solid color then a sing stage polyurethen is the way to go for durability. if your doing any stripes then bc/cc.
the thickness of gelcoat shoudn’t really exceed the thickness you would have after about 3-4 coats of a 2k primer. i spent many years in the boating industry and have fixed many a crack in boat hulls. most are due to thick spots of gel sprayed in the mold from the factory. add a little flex to that and it just cant take it. gel is too brittle. rather than grinding out the back which in all honesty wont really do much, you should take the mold, spray in a couple good coats of gel, let it kick off then lay the glass in……or if you had to spray the gel in as i said then pour in some fiberglass resin like you did the gel. it wouldn’t be the ideal way to go but polyester laminating resin will be more durable than a kicked off piece of gelcoat.
nex, that looks great. keep that mold!! only problem i see here though is you used gelcoat to cast the part out of. gelcoat becomes unstable and willl crack easily when its thick. it has no strength and is brittle. really the thing to use is a casting resin. a urethane resin would work really well for what you got there since it will be more flexible, about the same as the original piece. just for future knowledge, always use a resin made for casting your parts. good job on it though. here are some good links for you.
http://www.tapplastics.com/shop/category.php?bid=33&PHPSESSID=20100606044232179345425
http://www.polytek.com/cart/index.php
urethanes and epoxy types are more flexible while polyesters tend to be rock hard.