Views on Spray can quality/ options

[Martinlee247]

Hi all, I am looking for advice and opinions on what brands you use or may have used to spray bikes?

I had a lockdown passion to strip and respray a bike for my wife (ok ok it was for me but she was a good excuse )

I watched a few of Martin Grey's ETOE videos for the general how to and he recommends the Montana gold range, and SprayMax clear coat. ( I also used Spray.bike primer too) Which I used ok. But interested to hear from anyone else to see what they have found to be good or bad?

Thanks for any ideas and thoughts

Martin

[Ugly]

I've used Spraybike with good results which I am sure would improve with practice.

[Jupestar]

I used Montana Gold on a similar project during lockdown. Looks good with the top coat, but still scratches.

Tip I was given was let it dry for ages between coats. And use lots of light coats.

Doesn’t come close to a professional job. But that’s probably not the point.

[simonineaston]

I still recall the fabulous job my friend Dave made of a Harley '45 tank (or tanks to be exact, as they formed a pair, with the smaller oil tank being scalloped sufficent to accept the larger petrol tank...). He painted it cream, with blue and red starsNbars streaming down the sides, and the whole finished with gold pin-stripes. He did it all with aerosol cans and built up the laquer, coat after coat, until it was as good and as tough as a pro-shop paint job. As suggested upthread, he would leave each coat of laquer a while to harden, before flatting it ready for the next coat. I doubt most normal folk have Dave's patience!
I on the other hand, built up a Subeam S8 and painted it in the stock 'polychromatic gunmetal grey', shot through a gun. Funnily enough, I was contemplating a similar problem just now as I've recently bought a vintage Moulton, dating from '84, complete with its very plain, rather dull, grey wet paint finish. Time for a brighter change - or go with the stock dull grey again ? Who knows!

[David9694]

For off the shelf, I find Holts car paints are good. Likewise, Halfords.

With Canbrush,I found I got a lot of “fallout” from their metallic paints - perhaps more shaking needed? The Candy green seemed more like a metallic.

Primers and clear coats all seem a muchness and you can pay different amounts for this.

House of Kolor was good as a Pearl. Kustom Canz did me a nice red candy. A while back I used Riolett Gentian blue Pearl: so happy was I I got the red and the pink, neither of which seemed a nice colour. I then had a problem with a duplicate web order and they’re on the never again list now for me.

For some reason, pearl white seems to always fight back, seems more prone to drips and sags. That’s usually been Paints4you (two part) or Hycote.

I started out with Spray.bike, so I owe it a debt, but you get a better finish from car paint IME.

You need a warm, still day, and a lot of patience. I recommend either having two frames on the go, or having something else you can go back to for 10-15 minutes to allow each layer to cure.

[peetee]

I too have had good results from the Halfords sprays.
It’s worth mentioning too that with any product the right prep of the bike and shaking of the spray tins is paramount. The rule I have adopted is once you think you have shaken it enough shake it just as much again!

[hamster]

Honestly, I wouldn't bother. All the car sprays etc are fragile and chip easily. By the time you have finished it's £50-100 including abrasives etc.

Take the frame to your local powdercoater, they will blast it and recoat for the same price. I have done it several times over the years and the paint finish is tough and durable.

It is possible to paint a bike with rattle cans, but it's hard to get into all the nooks and crannies. It's a totally different job to painting a car panel or motorbike tank.

[freiston]

hamster beat me to it. Spraying a bike frame is something I've not done since the late 70s/early 80s - and then my dad did it in his workshop (he was a maintenance painter & decorator for a large company and used to do their lorry spraying and sign-writing too). My bike was exactly the same shade of yellow as their lorries

If you want a good durable finish, a professional powder-coating job will probably be about the same price (possibly cheaper?) as doing it yourself with spray cans. You won't have to worry about dust, ventilation, overspray etc. either.

[peetee]

Powder coating has its advantages but I have yet to see an application thin enough that I would be happy to have it on any of my lugged frames.

[Carlton green]

It’s thread diversion but I hope that the OP won’t mind, and my questioning does follow on from some recent posts.

Whilst spray can painting can do some jobs I do wonder what ‘better’, easier and good enough - but still smart - ways there might be of repainting a bike frame. A car panel is obviously different, whilst I never get a perfect finish other items are presentably and effectively protected with traditional hand brush applied paints. If colour and/or shade isn’t too critical and one has access to powder coating / commercial painters then perhaps that’s an even better route to go - pragmatic choice.

Unless the OP is dead-set on spray cans I suggest that the alternatives are worth investigation and consideration.

[hamster]

Powder coating has its advantages but I have yet to see an application thin enough that I would be happy to have it on any of my lugged frames.

I totally agree - a wet sprayed stove enamel is much the best thing for a nice lugged frame.

[David9694]

hamster beat me to it. Spraying a bike frame is something I've not done since the late 70s/early 80s - and then my dad did it in his workshop (he was a maintenance painter & decorator for a large company and used to do their lorry spraying and sign-writing too). My bike was exactly the same shade of yellow as their lorries

If you want a good durable finish, a professional powder-coating job will probably be about the same price (possibly cheaper?) as doing it yourself with spray cans. You won't have to worry about dust, ventilation, overspray etc. either.

DIY-ing with rattle cans is a labour of love and by the time you’ve bought panel wipe, primer, 2 cans of topcoat, a clearcoat, and several sheets of wet & dry, you’re nudging the cost of powder coating. I’m happy with the powder coat job I had done on a lugged frame, in a Matt-ish, single solid colour kind of way.

[Martinlee247]

Hi all and many thanks for comments and views, all very interesting, and please accept my apology in the late reply. I lost the post thread and never got any notifications on replies ;-( (I’ll tick the box now)

My interest in bike spraying goes back to my desire and need to take things apart completely, (I remember taking my friends SRAM X9 rear shifter apart, 3 springs popped out and after many hours I finally got it back and working). So once I have the frame bare I want to remove paint and them spray so I can rebuild the bike. Since posting this I have sprayed 2 more bikes again using Montana but a Halfords clear coat.

I have since sold them just looking to recover the cost of materials which I have just about done

I will try the Halfords and Holt range thanks and I will try a few more and keep up,with the DIY paining despite the suggestion of a pro job, which I would have do if my beloved Anthem needed a respray.

Again apologies to those who took time to respond and share their views for my tardiness in responding.

And if someone would advise how I add images I’ll share a couple of my amateur projects …..

Cheers
Martin


PS Out of interest how are new bikes painted, anyone know I assume simply pro spray and water based decals?

[thirdcrank]

Adding images is straightforward.

In the POST A REPLY screen, click on "Attachments" then "add files"

At that point you can select the image(s) you want to add. A big improvement has been the addition of the capability of the forum software to reduce the size of image files to comply with the requirements. Be warned that the max at one go is five images - the software won't warn you but the extra will be dropped. If you want to attach more than five, do a second post

[Jdsk]

And if someone would advise how I add images I’ll share a couple of my amateur projects …..

You can upload images as above. And you can link to them on external services such as Dropbox.

Which would you prefer?

Jonathan