beautifying beausage: caring for worn paint

[Matthew P]

While on the topic of paint, what does one do, other than just enjoy it, when the bike's paint has "plenty of beausage"?

I'm building an Atlantis whose paint has some wear.  The areas where the chain ate the paint are really the problem, although perhaps my approach helps protect those places.

There are spots on this frame where it looks like you can see the clearcoat separate from the paint underneath.  I'd just like for those parts to blend a little better and give the paint an overall cleaner look, just "smooth things out" if possible.  Not repaint.  Not even touch it up (although I am interested in getting some Atlantis Russian submarine interior green touch up paint, if the people in the know see this).

I'm thinking I'll try waxing it, which would at least protect the paint & metal some, if it doesn't make it look better.  

I assume a rubbing compound would be too much, would strip away too much clear coat and paint.

Would a buffing compound be appropriate?

I have little experience with paint care, clearly.

Thanks.

-Matthew

San Diego

[Joe Bernard]

I don't know anything about paint either, but here's Jim's touch-up page. Atlantis is at the top.

http://www.cyclofiend.com/rbw/color.html

[George Schick]

There was a blog post along similar lines a few months ago where a rider had received a brand new frame that had scratches on the top tube and he wanted to know the best way to remove them.  He ultimately took the frame to an auto detailer (a good idea if you have no experience using various rubbing or polishing compounds!)  However, one suggestion that was posted was to use Mequiar's Ultimate Compound to rescue the paint.  I bought some of this and it's a great suggestion.  But if the right chain stay, which seems to be your biggest issue, is too pitted up from chain slap marks, you may have to repaint or at least touch it up.  When you've finally decided what you want to do with that, then cover it with "helicopter tape" to protect it from future damage.  If you need a piece of that stuff to finish the job, let me know.  I have plenty of extra leftover from my application and I'd be glad to send you some of it.

[Matthew P]

Excellent George.  

Those sound like great suggestions for different types of paint wear.  

If I can't get a small amount of helicopter tape (interested to look this up) for a decent price, I'll contact you.

Thank you.

[Pancake]

I recommended Meguier’s Ultimate Compound in the earlier thread, great stuff you can work with by hand and a towel, you really can’t screw it up.

Any chance you could post some photos of the damage? Restore paint works great. Mix a couple to get it close. Or just any fingernail polish if you’re inclined to simply fill a chip - blood red could be nice.

[islaysteve]

With regard to the right chainstay paint damage, why not wrap, twine and shellac it?  My Bleriot came to me from its previous owner that way.  This is purported to be yellow cloth handlebar tape with several coats of red shellac. 

[Joe Bernard]

He could wrap it since the damage is already done, but personally I really dislike this trend on steel frames. I want to be able to see what's going on under there, and I worry that moisture gets trapped under all that fancy wrapping/shellacking/twining folks are doing to their Rivs.

[George Schick]

But Joe, ain't this also true of powder coating.  IIRC, Grant himself made a blog post about discontinuing powder coating, esp. clear coating on the proveltos, because he saw signs of rust underneath the clear PC.  Unlike true wet coat paints, no primer is used with PC jobs.  The primer is designed to form a chemical bond between the steel and the paint and then subsequent base and clear coats on top of that.

[Joe Bernard]

Maybe George, but paint questions are above my pay grade. I wrap stuff 😬

[Matthew P]

Thank you for the responses.  Here are some pics attached of the frame.  

I would like to protect the bare metal and also improve the general appearance/finish to the paint.

I plan to clean surfaces with rubbing alcohol, lightly sand the bare metal, get & apply some Atlantis paint from the Cyclofiend link (thank you), apply the Meguires Ultimate Compound (looks great!) all over, and perhaps protect that drive side chain stay with helicopter tape or whatever I have on hand.  I'll "frame save" the insides best I can.

Sounds like a solid plan.  Just gotta get to it.

Thanks again everyone.

-Matthew

San Diego

[Pancake]

Some polish wouldn’t hurt but it won’t do much. Options:
(1) If you can get or mix some matching-ish paint and fill it in with a tiny paint brush or even a toothpick. A little denatured alcohol to smooth down lumps of excess paint. Nail polish could also work.
(2) Embrace it as is, won’t hurt anything.
(3) Wrap it, nice look and means you can do anything you like further down the road.
Abe