The Custom Motorcycle Paint Job

A good motorcycle paint job can be expensive, why is that. It is because once the motorcycle is ready for the final color application, things slow down a lot, the final paint can be sprayed on in numerous layers; it's kind of a “paint, dry, paint, dry” process until the colors are as vivid as desired. The skill is walking the fine line between putting on too much paint or too little. If there are graphics involved, each color must be left to dry, then the next area needs to be masked off before spraying.

The first stage in masking off graphics is to use a thin ultra-flexible, plastic lining tape; this can create really smooth curves. Next, masking tape is laid partially over it and partially over newspaper to fully cover the rest of the bodywork.

On our current custom paint job we use a clever trick – once we paint all of the flat colors, we clear-coat the panels. It's more work, as he has to sand them down yet again spraying; but it's smart because if we messes up the pinstriping we can just wipe off the mistake with no damage to the fresh paint that's now been sealed in by the clear coat.

Pinstriping relies on plain old-fashion skill with a brush and a steady hand. Our clear coat trick quickly pays off, as one of the original color choices for the pinstriping didn't work. So after some support from a friend, the design is modified.

On most bikes, the whole thing would be clear coated now as the painting would be finished, but part of our design includes some airbrush work. This requires a completely different bag of tricks, so for that we call in a specialist friend.