Repainting the engine.

After this Winter has taken it's toll on the paintwork of my SV650S, I decided to repaint it and give it a fresh look. I'll be doing a quickish job of it, by that I mean the engine will remain in the frame, and I will be masking areas off like the frame, downpipe etc.

So off to Halfords to get some high temperature paint. I found a matt black and also some cleaning solvent to degrease/demuck the area first.

This is what the engine block looked like before starting.



Notice how the paint has completely peeled away between engine blocks. I had already started by the time I realised I could document it, so the rest of the pictures are from the other side. Both sides were as bad as each other; infact the left side was worse.

First clean the area of all dirt, grease, salt, everything. A wash and dry first, follwed by the cleaning solvent from Halfords, got the area nice and prepped. Then I sanded down the area with a sanding foam pad. It was useful because it got into the nooks while still being able to grip it well enough to be effective. Notice I haven't sanded down the valve cover. This I will be doing when I check the valve clearances.



More solvent cleaner got rid of the paint dust. After masking off the areas and getting down to as much bare aluminium as I could, I started spraying. The key, I found, was to spray in very short bursts. The paint dried to the touch within a few seconds.



I'm not too concerned at the moment with spraying the crankcase cover. I can remove the paint later with a some Autoglym.

As I said, take your time when spraying. I started to go a little quicker because it was all going well. I ended up putting too much on in one go and this happenned.



I had to remove the paint back to bare metal, wet and dry it, and repaint. Don't be tempted to use more solvent cleaner, as the drips will spoil the paint and will also need sanding again before repainting. It's spoilt it a little, but it doesn't look at all bad. The can says to wait 10-15 minutes between coats, until dry to the touch. As the area was so small and the coats of paint are ultra thin, I put a new coat on after 3 minutes or so.

More to come tommorrow when there's daylight to finish it off.

[Spiderman]

Lookind forward to the next instalment of this mate. Mine is in need of the same treatment but i'm gonna see what your finished project looks like first before i attempt mine.

Also, can you post up the names of the products you use please. The solvent cleaner and the high temp paint mainly.

I'm tempted to do mine with high temp Hammerite or matt black BBQ paint at the moment.

looking fwd to next instalment

ditto the above

Originally Posted by Spiderman

Also, can you post up the names of the products you use please. The solvent cleaner and the high temp paint mainly.

I used halfords own brand VHT Matt Black paint and Sufrace Cleaner. A quick tip if you use these. Keep the caps on them when you've used it. Don't spray cleaner on to a freshly painted surface like I did

I'm a bit behind with it due to me cleaning my carbs yesterday, but I got the other side to the same point as the one in the photo. It still looks the same after a run, but I don't know how long it takes to fully cure. Maybe my trip to Donington Park will be enough.

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I used halfords own brand VHT Matt Black paint and Sufrace Cleaner. A quick tip if you use these. Keep the caps on them when you've used it. Don't spray cleaner on to a freshly painted surface like I did

I'm a bit behind with it due to me cleaning my carbs yesterday, but I got the other side to the same point as the one in the photo. It still looks the same after a run, but I don't know how long it takes to fully cure. Maybe my trip to Donington Park will be enough.

I don't want ot **** on your parade but the halfords stuff is useless

I sprayed the exhaust on my enduro with it , taking extra care and following instructions.

3 days later it burns and peels and I am back to a rusty exhaust.

hope your more sucessful, but I won't be buying that crap again need to find a supplier of pj1 paint again, because it works