FJRiders.com

Most of you know of my bout with stupidity in El Paso this past April when I laid my bike down and it cost me my blue hottie. Well, after some shoulder recovery, the time has come to give her the much needed plastic surgery she deserves. I am doing this repair on a budget mainly because I'm a cheap bastage, but still, I'm not willing to sacrifice quality. I invested in a used right fairing, and left side stator cover, and a forum member came through with a right muffler. The saddlebags and left faring will be repaired. The nose cowl was purchased new as well as the dreaded fairing stay, and a new Givi top box. And so it begins....


The right side is what took most of the damage as that's the side I went down on first when it went over the curb.


The saddlebag had some deep scratches in it


I random orbit sanded the rash boogers off to prep it for filler. A forum member recommended a finishing filler called Icing which I found on Amazon. It goes on like Bondo with an activator. I'm using an adhesion promoter for all filler and primer when going over bare plastic.


The right fairing was too far gone to mess with, so I got a used one off of ebay. It's asphalt gray but will soon be turned into the fastest color Yamaha ever made.


The bike some how managed to roll onto it's left side as we migrated across the divider curb but the damage was less on this side.


This should buff right out.


The left saddlebag endured some surface scratches. Note the mud hole in the Givi box, don't know what it hit but whatever it was won.


The fairing lip here took some grinding action.


I didn't want to build this up with body filler, I figured that would be asking too much from it on an edge like that. So I ordered a Plastex kit made for ABS. I really like this product, it bonds well with the sub surface and provides a solid repair. I also used it on a cracked stiffener rib to weld it back together. Next comes the finishing filler.


The gouges on the stater cover were too deep for me to want to mess with so I found this cover on ebay. Of course the paint knicks show up much better in my photo than in the ebay ad.


I scuffed it down and shot it with some automotive grade spray paint. Close enough for this old Texican, it's the only part that I was able to get finished today


I know enough about body work to get most things done, but I'm armed and dangerous. I'm a little better with painting. If there's anything you see that could make things easier or better on me, I'm all ears.

Looking good, Tex!

They really are tough bikes. Considering the circumstances, it's mostly cosmetic and with your skills, she'll be good as new real soon.

Good thing - Arkansas weather is starting to get nice!!

Yeah, with my motto of why do today what can be put off until tomorrow, Arkansas is what's driving this. Some of us do better with dead lines it seems.

I think it was RFH that said riding gear is a farkle. I agree, this is what showed up on the doorstep.

The bike in the photos, is it Huds? Cuz it looks like Huds.

I saw the title and thought it was about Jason's bike

Man those were some deep scratches on the case. and all kinds of directions too. Looking forward to seeing the progress on that one for sure.

I've never understood why they named "Painting" after the shortest and easiest part of the process. Should be called "Sanding."

Good work Bud. Even better to see you fixing the ol gurl up with makeup!

She'll be as good as new..... dont envy that mirror stay job, BTDT split that into a 2 day job and take your time.

I've been trying to make progress on the restoration project but rain and subsequent bugs have made things quite challenging. Last weekend was largely a waste of time, Saturday started out raining it's ass off, just like both days of the prior week end, so no painting got done. Last Sunday I was able to finish prepping the panels and got the base coat shot, then here come the bugs. Disappointed, I scuffed them down during the week and shot the panels with base and clear again on Friday after work, bugs still came around but not like they did last week end. Yesterday I was able to make some good progress with reinstalling parts. Front stay, nose cowl, windshield, right muffler, rashed bolts and bar ends, levers. I bought some water proof grease on Amazon that seems like it did well on the levers.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VJP5P0/null

This is the right side bag that had the worst damage on it. I was able to get the deep scratches filled in using a finishing filler called Icing, and applied a high build primer after that. Just ignore the reflection of the guy that didn't know how to stay out of the way.


The left side bag had some surface scratches that sanded out easily and primed it as well.


The right fairing is a used ebay replacement, there's some bug carcasses entombed in the clear coat if you look closely, I was able to scuff down and somewhat buff out some of them today. Complete color sanding and polishing will have to wait now since Hooterville is just around the corner.





For the worst of the bug trash, I stopped by Auto Zone yesterday and picked up some 1000 and 1500 grit wet/dry sand paper and they had this nifty little kit which worked well for today's touch up session. I scuffed the worst of the trash down and buffed them out. Like I said before, the rest will just have to wait for later.


The right side fairing vent cover was scratched which also needed to be sanded down and primered. It is the lower one of the two, the upper one is the left side with factory paint.


When I took the mirrors apart, I found that Yamaha had not stacked up the Bellville washers correctly.


This is the correct way to orient these type of washers so that the spring quality they are made to do can work properly. It explains why my mirrors never wanted to fold in very easily. Tsk tsk mamma yamma. I made use of the water proof grease on the mirror pivots also.


While I was painting black I did my son's saddle bag. He has also been Jonesing for Gen II mirrors for his bike because he likes the looks of them better. A forum member had a scratched set off of his '07 he sent me which are now black and waiting for him. I found it interesting that when I sanded the scratches down, there was cobalt blue underneath on one of them. On my oem cobalt blue set, one of them had the root beer color underneath.




I got rained on around 4 times this afternoon. If it wasn't for that, the bike would've been done today. Will see what can happen after work tomorrow.

Looking quite well. Get her together - Arkansas won't wait forever....

Inspirational. Seriously. You've got me thinking about doing some body work when I do electrical stuff in December.

Uncle Hud wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 12:08 pm Inspirational. Seriously. You've got me thinking about doing some body work when I do electrical stuff in December.

Now to figure out how to cut down on the crashing bit, body work is a huge pain for this ole Texican.

Nice work and when it's finished, you should be good to go for YFO next year!!

Gonna make Hooterville?

0face wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 8:57 pm Gonna make Hooterville?

It's looking good so far

Good job!

Uncle Hud wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 12:08 pm Inspirational. Seriously. You've got me thinking about doing some body work when I do electrical stuff in December.

Don't know what the bug situation is like over there by you, my only advice would be to wait until they go into hibernation. I don't remember them ever being this bad this time of year.

Goodness, they have been very bad this year and I don't ever remember it being like this. Even short rides require a full debugging of the helmet. I can't imagine trying to paint with them. You need a sealed booth for that!