Before you can even begin to consider painting or even priming your bodypanels, you need to make sure they are in a good state. Since I had bought a cheap tank from eBay for my Honda CB500, I’d pretty much set myself up for a fair bit of prep work. The tank looked pretty reasonable on the picture with the eBay listing, but unfortunately upon receiving it I found a whole lot of rust, dents and bubbling paint. Now I’m extremely stubborn and wanted to prove to myself (and others finding themselves in similar situations!) that with a bit of reading, and some cheap tools and materials from Halfords and High Street, I can restore this bodywork and make it look great after paint.

So as you can see, the tank looks decent (on a picture, not in real life!) with the paint still on. But some of the paint is bubbling, indicating that there is rust underneath it which will sooner or later cause it to peel off. Therefore I cannot paint over the existing finish.

In that way the state of the tank pretty much decided my next step; which (power)tools to buy! I impulsively went ahead and bought a Black & Decker Multisander from Argos (it was on sale…). It’s a random orbital sander which comes with a triangular base as well as a round one. However after trying to sand some of the paint off, I found that although it could do it (eventually), it eats up the sand paper way too quickly.

So today I went on another shopping spree and bought a little 600W Draper Angle Grinder. I know it’s not the most powerful one out there, but that’s OK; I’m not particularly strong (and for those that aren’t aware - I’m a girl) and the thought of having to wield a huge 900W angle grinder was not very appealing at all. I also bought a poly carbide abrasive disc to go with the grinder.

As soon as I got home and unpacked my stuff, my husband couldn’t contain his curiosity and immediately assembled the grinder, putting on the abrasive disc and taking it to the same tank. Turns out (in spite of its relatively low wattage) this grinder is actually quite effective. Have a look at 5 minutes worth of paint stripping:

We figure it will probably take 30-45 minutes to do the whole tank.

However, the rest of the body panels are made of plastic, instead of metal. So they will need to be sanded down with the multisander and by hand, which should take a fair bit of elbow grease.

UPDATE:

So last weekend we felt like making a mess as well as a whole lot of noise… The tank is now fully stripped, eating up the entire grinding pad. It took about an hour, but the result is not bad:

Note the big dent on it, well there are plenty more on this tank, so the next step will be trying to get rid of them somehow…

Unfortunately my CB500 respray project has been on hold for the past couple of weeks. I’ve had nothing but trouble with the bike on the daily (modest) run to work. 

Symptoms: Perfect running until for no apparent reason the bike gets jerky, loses power, revs fall, and just acts as if it’s run out of petrol. Upon pulling over it would stall, and refuse to start for the next 3-4 minutes or so. After it does start again, upon revving it will backfire once or twice and continue to run perfectly until everything starts all over again….

So what does a girl do? Getting sick and tired of having the bike die on me in the midst of rush hour traffic up to three times in a 1.5 mile trip to work, I decided to drop the bike with a mechanic. Picking a “proper shop” nearby, I explained the problem and hoped for the best. Then I remembered that sometimes (every few months or so) the bike tends to overheat and spit out coolant. That little bit of extra information pretty much distracted the mechanic from then on - insisting that both problems MUST be related.

A phonecall a few hours later spelled trouble. The mechanic said he had a look around the cooling system of the bike and found that the coolant level was extremely low. He then tested the fan (which worked) and ran the bike a little. To his horror coolant gushed out of the bike as soon as the engine ran for a minute or so, not enough to make it hot!

His diagnosis: blown head gasket or cylinder ring. He told me he’d do a compression test.

Result: left cylinder: 175psi, right cylinder: 125psi. He was even more sure now that it was a major engine problem causing all my trouble… Quoting me a grand for all the work to put it right, I was totally horrified obviously (especially since the bike had cost me less than that in the first place!) so I decided to take it back as it was.

Mechanic #2. Luckily, there’s this other mechanic close to where I work who helped me out on previous occasions (see: Replacement Spark Plugs) I gave the bike to him, explaining what the other mechanic had said (blown headgasket - repair: 1000 bucks) and although the repair cost gave him a good laugh (and he quoted me about 350 for the same thing) he promised to have a good look around the bike to see what was up.

A few hours and phone calls later: he claimed the bike ran beautifully, and after having it on for a while, coolant stopped leaking out, making him suspect that it had been overfilled. It couldn’t possibly be anything as serious as the headgasket then… 

As my husband and I had suspected from the beginning of this whole ordeal, I told him maybe the tank and carbs are dirty. I asked him to strip the carbs and clean out the tank and see what he finds inside. He was happy to oblige. Indeed I get a cheerful phonecall that evening detailing how he’d found “a load of shit inside the carbs and tank” and the bike was still running beautifully. 

Yay! I got it back last night, drove it around til it overheated and spat coolant out again.. but it didn’t stop even once! Sure I know I should have the radiator fan looked at (It doesn’t cut in even when you could use the engine for a stove), but hey, from home to work it won’t even get luke warm. At the moment (having spent what I have just now on two separate mechanics’ fees) I think I’ve bought myself some time.

Morale of the story: 

1. Before paying a mechanic a grand to work on your old vehicle, take a second opinion!

2. If the bike feels like it’s not getting any fuel, it might just be as simple as it literally not getting any fuel.

3. Older bikes might have rust in the tank which might eventually cause running problems. 

For more information on headgasket problems, see my next post “Headgasket Woes”.

A few months back I tried to start the CB500 in the cold, and stupidly switched on the choke before switching in the engine on. This little mistake turned into a big nuisance as the engine started, coughed and stopped and left me standing outside my office, repeatedly trying to start the bike again. However as the engine had got flooded with excess petrol, nothing happened. I ended up parking the bike overnight, in order to get it fixed the following day.

As I told the mechanic what had happened he explained the following: Once the carbs flood with fuel, the spark plugs will get wet and basically become useless. After that, the points of the spark plugs (even if you do take them out, wipe them dry, and sand off the dirt from them) will never be clean enough to give a reliable spark.

It’s not all that bad though. Replacement spark plugs come for around £6, and if you have the original tools that come with the bike, you will already have all required tools to replace the spark plugs yourself.

Here’s what you do. Once you get two replacement spark plugs, take the side covers (shrouds) off the tank. On the top of the engine you will see black rubber plugs which go all the way inside. This is a little fiddly, especially if you have big hands, but it’s just about possible to pull out the plugs from the engine and take them out entirely, put the spark plug socket inside the cavity you just removed the rubber plugs from. Open the spark plug by twisting on the tool with a spanner going anti clockwise. This may require quite a bit of force!

Once the spark plugs are unscrewed, just take them out, if you can reach make sure the area round the spark plugs is clean and dry, and put the new one in. Repeat this process on the other side of the engine. Once you’re done, simply push the plugs back in, make sure they are properly tightly connected - you might feel a subtle click when they push in, after which they won’t move around anymore. Then put the shrouds back on and you should be up and running!

Just wanting to look something up I did a quick search for an online version of a service manual, well here is the full thing:

Honda CB500(S) 93-01 Service Manual

There are few things you’d enjoy less on that bike ride you’ve been working towards for months than being stranded in some foreign country, on a motorway, with a broken down motorcycle! However it is surprising how many people take a very passive approach to preparing for such situations! For instance, most motorcyclists I know, will just up and go one day without preparation or even proper packing, and if they break down somewhere, they get stuck. They’ll laugh it off if it happens to someone else, and mostly tend to get lucky during their trips. But if something does happen, personally I’d rather be sure that something can be done about it.

I wouldn’t want to rely on my linguistic skills in a foreign country, firstly trying to find a mechanic, and then trying to arrange for transport, furthermore trying to explain the problem. I’d much rather have these things sorted for me.

So for exactly that reason, when we went to France over the Easter Break on our Moto Guzzi California EV, we got some Breakdown Cover
before leaving, to cover our entire trip.

The process of signing up for European breakdown cover with the AA is fairly straightforward. You just get a quote on their website, and pay with your credit card. Then within moments you will (if you opted to) receive an SMS and an Email with the policy details and contact numbers in case of a breakdown.

We were very glad that during our entire trip nothing whatsoever went wrong with the bike, but just in case it was a good decision to get the cover beforehand.

However: if you’re serious about covering yourself against breakdowns in a foreign country, you should make sure that you opt for the level of support you would like. For instance, the basic breakdown cover can only do so much, if you have children with you, or other important obligations, it may make sense to get some extra level of cover added on to your policy.

And in case you need to travel abroad more than once a year, why not get annual cover and save some money on the premium as well…

If you’re looking into repainting your motorcycle (or other vehicle) yourself, depending on the skills and budget you have, there are various options for you to consider. They inevitably are divided by cost constraints, as you will see.

“The $50 repaint”

This method was conceived to be done on classic cars, if all you’ve got is lots of time, willingness to get your hands dirty and elbow grease to spare - but a very low budget. For a motorcycle, $50 may be a huge exaggeration, you could do it way cheaper than that.

Basically this method involves sanding, sanding and more sanding, painting the bodywork with a high density paint roller and Rustoleum paint (but you could probably use any other metal paint as well). Since the finish from a paint roller might not be perfect, you need to sand properly in between various coats to achieve a good finish. Why not head over to this site here: RickWrench.com and have a look at the entire process plus end result.It’s really quite impressive what a lot of time and painstaking effort can achieve!

The rattle-can

A much more widely used method for repainting motorcycles is doing it with a can of metal paint. With this method, it is a bit closer to the professional finish since both are sprayed on; however cans don’t necessary spray very evenly and you may have runny paint because you cannot adjust the viscosity of the paint. Nevertheless, if you are still willing to invest some time cleaning up the paintwork before giving it some clear coat over the top, you can achieve a pretty good finish. Don’t forget however that you will require more than just your colour of choice! Depending on what state the existing paintwork on your bike is like, you might need Adhesion promoter or primer before putting the final colour on. If you want the paintwork to really pop with shine, a clear coat will be required over the top.

How much paint you’ll require and therefore what the budget should be, would depend on the state of your motorcycle’s paintwork, and the amount of bodywork to be painted. But since a can of paint comes for around £5.99 at Halfords, it shouldn’t really break the bank. Add to that sand paper, masking tape and such, and perhaps £50 should cut it for most bikes.

The Semi-Pro

If you have a big budget, lots of enthusiasm and would like to repaint bikes more often, you could go down the semi-pro route of buying an air compressor, a proper spray gun and real automotive paint. Mind you though, you will need a lot of space, and if you aim to get a perfect finish, lots of practice plus a non-dusty yet well ventilated area to do the spraying in. For equipment costs alone, think several hundred pounds for this paint method - it really is not suitable for those on a tight budget!

Air Compressors : People often wonder how much they should spend on an air compressor. The opinion amongst fellow hobbyists seems unanimous - as much as you can possibly afford! In any case you should buy a compressor which has an air tank attached to it, otherwise the spray will not be even, but pulsed. Also, depending on the type of spray gun you would like to use, your compressor needs to be able to cope with the air flow. (HVLP Guns require a lot of air displacement but less pressure, conventional spray guns require more pressure but not so much flow).

Spray Guns : A regular spray gun is basically a big sort of air brush with a fairly large paint container mounted to it. The paint container is either mounted at the bottom (suction fed spray gun) or at the top (gravity fed spray gun) and could be made of either metal or plastic. The advantage of a suction fed spray gun is that it usually has more paint capacity - so it’s better suited for larger projects, whereas a gravity fed spray gun is usually lighter and easier to use around smaller items (over head spraying).

What’s HVLP? Many spray guns are HVLP guns - this stands for High Volume Low Pressure. Basically what it means is, the air is fed through the gun at a relatively lower pressure, but the flow is much higher. This makes the finish better than with a conventional spray gun, and reduces overspray. However, it does mean that this type of gun will only work with a good, high power air compressor that can sustain a lot of flow over a longer period of time.

Keep in mind that if you’re using an HVLP gun with any DIY/Hobby air compressor that can fit in your garage, chances are that the tank of the compressor will empty more quickly than what the compressor can sustain. This means that if you’re spraying for extended periods, you might need to take breaks to allow the tank to refill.

Accessories : In order to make your set up work, you need to be able to connect the spray gun to the compressor properly. Also you need to make sure that your paint remains clean. Because air compressors generally have screw on connections in standard sizes, you have to make sure that the air hose is appropriate for your spray gun (the connector might be non standard, depending on the type of gun you buy. Then get an adaptor or converter to fit your compressor. Also keep in mind that at times you may need more than one spray gun, so it might make sense to look into quick connectors that allow easy exchange of spray guns. And another thing that is extremely important is ensuring the air from the compressor is clean (water / oil free) so a filter is absolutely essential! While mounting your water / oil trap, make sure it is connected closer to the spray gun rather than directly to the compressor - in case warm air comes out of your compressor opening and cools down inside the air hose, condensation may occur if the water trap is mounted too close to the compressor.

Safety : Depending on the type of paint you intend to use, it may become extremely vital to use an appropriate mask, suit and glasses. Please consult with the usage instructions of the paint or the shop where you’re purchasing it from regarding appropriate safety precautions.