Best rattlecan paint for bikes?

Anyone had any success with a gloss silver / chrome spray paint?

is spray.bike really gonna be better than MTN94?

Much depends on what you are spraying- plastikote 'chrome effect' is about the best I've found (code number 150-S) but it remains quite soft and marks easily so probably not much good for frames. Additional coats of clear lacquer seem to dull the finish and any contamination at all will show, such as fingerprints from handling between coats.
Aluminium spray paint is often brighter than so-called chrome or silver...

Hi everyone any advice appreciated.
I'm wanting to spray my bike green with orange detail. Thinking of using the Spray.Bike orange as underlayer then spraying a green on top with a bit of taping / stencilling. Really like the finish of candy green but will that go on top of the Spray.Bike??? Also am I likely to get a decent enough finish with the candy spray as a complete novice?? Thanks

Anyone had any joy painting over fresh powdercoat? I want to paint my headtube yellow.

this is rattlecan spray

1 Attachment

Bumping this thread because I've got a new functional frame. It's currently black, but ratty, I want to tidy it up/respray it black again in my garden. Is spray.bike the best option? Is that POR-15 stuff OK?

Montana gold

Not rattlecan and therefore defeating the purpose of the thread, but I've repainted a frame using Halfords enamel and a decent brush - no overspray, can be done indoors, no problems with paint incompatibility, no issues with water condensing in the spray, and two coats gave enough thickness of paint to sand out runs and still cut back to a gloss finish. Obviously no good if you want anything other than a solid single colour, but it's still looking good after a couple of years.
https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/307091/ FWIW

Dredging this.

I’ve just made a start on another frame and I’m wondering how to go about finishing it once it’s built.

It’s a lugged frame so powdercoating is out.

I’m owed a paint job by a mate but he’s going to be between workshops when I get the frame built and I know I’ll want to use the frame ASAP.

I’m wondering if I can get a decent finish painting it myself.

I don’t have any painting ‘kit’ but I’m willing to take my time with primer, wet and dry sanding etc.

@MrE post above makes a good case for enamel but as I may get my mate to repaint it down the line I have got it on my mind to not do anything that will be troublesome to deal with in the future, I think I’ve heard complaints about enamel on car restoration tv shows?

I suspect the car 'restoration' presenters are concerned about paint incompatibility - either making an irretrievable mess on TV, or if they are serious about the restoration, generating a possible problem for any future owner.

It used to be easy with old metal things in need of restoration - most paint was either cellulose based (old) or oil based (probably older still) and even if you mistakenly used one type on top of the other there was a 50-50 chance it would still be ok.

Paint made in this century is a different game completely - you probably need to have a detailed conversation with your mate to be sure you don't use anything incompatible with his preferred materials if he's going to re-paint it later. Even then, if you leave it too long there could be changes in formulation that cause problems, as with Finnigans Smoothrite - it used to need a specific solvent (trichloroethylene if memory serves), but now it is environmentally friendly and doesn't work.

What I remember seeing on tv was related to sanding, one type of paint clogs the abrasives more than another or something?

I don’t even know if my mate would be sanding though so you’re right about talking to him if I want to go down that route.

Been looking into the enamel paint thing a bit more though and I may just try and do a permanent job myself.

Found Paragon Paints who have hundreds of colours and the prices are really good. They say their normal colours are good for brush or spray application (they advise spray application for fluorescent colours) and there’s stuff about wet edges and that that makes me think a good result would be achievable with their paint.

I also found Bilt Hamber Electrox primer which is designed for marine use but is popular with car restorers because of its anti corrosion properties. It seems it can protect the metal underneath it even if it gets scratched through to the metal because of the amount of zinc in it.

I think acrylics can be challenging if you're dry sanding - heat builds up quickly, the polymer softens and this leads to clogging - wet sanding works better but takes longer and can introduce other issues such as contamination and adequate drying before the next coat.

I suspect for TV they're looking for a quick surface prep before overpainting - just enough paint to look good. Some years ago I saw a program presented by Suggs, restoring a 1930s steam crane at Blists Hill (local to me) - it looked good on the telly, but was quite poor in real life and had major corrosion issues within a few months.

Paragon Paints look ok - their painting advice page makes sense to me. Personally I'd be brushing rather than spraying, but I'd be looking for a decent thickness of paint and I've spent too much time cleaning air brushes and spray guns after students have abused them, so maybe I'm biased. Zinc primers are generally a good thing...