Re finishing Corima 4 Spoke

So a while back i purchased @DragunovCZ1 's old Black and gold Makino NJS, a bike id admired since pat bought it himself. Id wanted an NJS track frame for a while to run a Corima 4 spoke HD on

After trolling on ebay for about 3 months i settled on a corima i had found and managed to win it for the £200 mark. Although it was a tub i went for it as i knew a restoration project would be in hand and it would primarily be a track wheel but i would have loved a clincher, to be honest ill probably buy a clincher if one arises on ebay or on the forum, i no how rare they are though.

So the Corima arrived in one piece, a little faded and old hat, so i stripped the tub off and started the restoration.

The plan was to re tint the carbon back to a stronger black as the wheel looked to me like it had spent to much time in the sunlight and re coat the wheel in 2k poly lacquer, a top coat used to lacquer car paint, NOT HALFORDS LACQUER IN A TIN!! Im a joiner by trade and i finish high level furniture in a multitude of finishes with an air feed spray system, so intended to do this properly and to a professional level. The wheel would be finished off with a decal pack direct from Corima in France or failing that i have access to a plotter at work and have high cad skills so can cad and cut them myself.

The wheel badly needed Bringing up to date

So i started by removing the decals with acetone and masked up the hub to prevent the lacquer covering the bearings and prepared the tint coat. I added a few drops of black cellulose paint to some 2k lacquer and mixed the desired colour i wanted and sprayed a few testers till i was happy with the coverage. The idea of the tint would be to create a new coat over the faded carbon to give the wheel a new a modern look, the first coat of paint would also act as a sealer coat for the top coats of lacquer to stick to. I gave the carbon wheel a quick 400 grit to key the carbon for the tint coat, panel wiped the dust off and sprayed the tint coat.

2K lacquer air drys, its not a lacquer that requires baking to harden so i managed to spray both sides and leave the wheel for a few days over the weekend to harden right off before i would flattened the coat off to remove any orange peal or runs before continuing with the lacquer process.

I intended to spray 4 heavy coats of lacquer on either side of the rim to give the wheel the desired look i was after. I believe the rim is reasonably old from how close the carbon weave is compared to the newer corimas but with a heavy polished finish and some up to date decals it should look sweet. From spraying the tint coat vertically in the spray booth i found it fairly difficult to apply heavy coats without runs so i jigged the wheel flat on a lazy suzan which should make coverage without runs alot easier. So with the wheel jigged i sprayed two heavy coats with a 15 minute break between the 2 coats so the lacquer could flash off and then left it 24 hours before flipping and spraying 2 coats on the opposite side of the rim.

I left the wheel 24 hours again and repeated the process so either side of the wheel had 4 coats of lacquer. I would flattened the final coat and polish out any dust that had settled in the top coat to make it flawless.

I polished up the wheel today with a fine grit glaze polishing compound and a polishing sponge on a slow setting in my drill to just take out the dust and over spray before applying the new decal pack

well happy with the decals, hopefully ill get the center hub "carbon technology - made in france" decal caded and plotted tomorrow just leaving the tape,tub and skewer to be installed :)

This is the original hub decal that ill cad from and create a new version to tie in the rim with the up to date decal pack

Looked better before.

Excellent work.

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shieeeet i didn't know you had that makino, i wondered where that ended up

That lacquer finish looks super slick Forty4Sixteen!! Really nice work.

Not a fan of the newer decals, but the lacquer job is 10/10

If you do get some hub decals made up, let me know. I've got a front clincher which could do with new ones.

But you just said it looks "shit" on whatsapp??

Its never gonna be everyones taste. I like the new corimas and thats the reason i decided to do the restoration, I outbid matt on ebay at the last minute :(

i would have preferred the old decal but i like how the carbon now looks fresh.

still, very slv

@Forty4Sixteen great read, great restoration. Top skills, well done.

You've done a great job with this and going against the grain, I reckon it looks much much better with the new decals.

read this over breakfast this morning, looks really nice. i need to do this with my corima, if you end up printing the hub decal can you print a couple more to sell to me?!

That finish is top, do you have access to matte or satin lacquer?

That finish is top, do you have access to matte or satin lacquer?

Can't wait to see this in the flesh!

all the corima owners cropping up in this thread. Where's @Tp88 ?

Haha we all need something, had been messaging Ben about this for a while but it's nice to see it all written up.

Nice thread and a cool resto project. Ignore the haters - looks like you've done an awesome job.

so @IR inspired me to do the write up tbh along with @privatepatterson coz of both their interests over instagram. I know its not everyones taste but every corima ive seen on this forum looks tired or dated. I love the wheels but to get a high end 4 spoke nowadays your gonna be way out of pocket so the aim was to go against the grain @7VEN and see what i could do in the workshop and if it failed its not a huge loss of ££ wise but a loss of a nice wheel.

I was hoping a few corima owners would pop up to see what positive feedback was out there. I caded a basic hub decal today out of white vinyl just as a temp one untill i come up with a final solution as is discovered corima have used quite a distinctive vinyl and font which is really difficult to cut and apply at the scale its needed. Ive been in contact with corima through the whole restoration project and they can supply me the hub decal for both sides but at a cost of £50 inc postage. Im willing to go ahead and order one myself if the temp one doesnt hold up once i see it on the bike. Also so you guys can see @Mechamorgan @adam3000

Indra suggested i offer this as a service on the forum if people were interested in restorations, its quite a responsibilty taking someones pride and joy and refurbing it hoping they like it but i can spray both gloss/satin or matt finishes or even block colour and any decal designs can potentially be cut and applied but i would suggest you come see the wheel in the flesh. The system i got at work is amazing but the finish wont be 100% flawless as i work in a fairly dusty environment and the process is damn hard.

The lacquer or paint kits retail at £50 ish and from start to finish ive put around 8 hours work in plus the cost of vinyl and postage etc so not to pricey

So the new temp hub decal

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Order the hub decals then scan them hi res an vectorise them? Sell a few re pros then you would make your moneys back after a few surely..

How much would it be to repaint a zipp 3000? ;-)

I kinda want a nice wheel for you to re-finish it for me!

Yep, ace job, mad skills!
Did you weight the wheel before and after the restoration? Any major difference?

Major weight savings obvs :) Great project, good to know that by the time I can afford crabonz the old gods might still be rideable.