Picked up my tanks today. It was a mixed emotion. First off, painter's primary market is roadracers, which as you know, do not stay painted very long. His personal name for himself is the Walmart of Painters. That said, he does everything right and used good paint. The OEM tank looks good except the painted on pinstripes are a little ragged where he pulled off the masking tape. Did not run a razor down the paint before pulling. But his price does not lead one to believe he is going to spend hours on details.
My orange and white tank came out great, except the stripe is a littel crooked. This was not noticed until I got it home. This bugs me, but I'll wait and see if it is truly noticeable when the tank is on the bike and the seat is in place.
Normally, I'm an anal PIA about stuff like this, but he only charges $275/tank so when you look at what the paint alone would cost, it's a damn good price. And I'm a firm believer that you get what you pay for. And the painter never gave me any false impressions about him being a detail fanatic. I was willing to take a chance for the price based on what I saw on his website and a recommendation from a guy who has had him paint a few older Beemers. I'm going to get in touch with him about the cockeyed stripe after I see how it looks on the bike.
Regarding the paint colors on the OEM paint tank: There was good paint to use as a guide under the badges and on the bottom of the tank. He had it scanned and mixed. I'm sure he will tell me what it was, if there is a code that goes with a scanned and mixed paint batch.
After this experience, I've decided that I'm going to do all my own paint from now on. I've always wanted to, but I've got zero experience with the new paints and very limited with old paints. I can shoot paint with the best of them, but it is knowing how the paints work that is key. My painter was telling me how things have changed and one of the features/curses of the new paint is the recoat time window. He says the paints are designed for repair shops. The primers need to be shot with color within so many hours or the color coat may peel or cause other problems. My roadracer paint was a urethane that peeled like latex on a teflon pan after I wrecked and started to strip the bike for a repair and repaint. Obvious example of too much time between primer and topcoat. I stripped the entire tank in about a half hour with a putty knife. The primer looked like it had just been shot and block sanded.
My cousin is pretty good with this stuff and in the auto biz. I hate to ask for his help because he is pulled in a million different directions by so many people. But I think I just need some good starter coaching and then I'll be able to do this stuff myself and to my own personal and to quote GPZ, "picky" standards. By the way, Paul, I take picky as a compliment.
If I get the paint number/code, I'll post here.
regards,
Rob
