Bike Resto info

Nice bike, I am sure you can find most cosmetic stuff like a seat cover and such on ebay and what not. If your redoing the frame, I would powdercoat it. I am working on 2 87 RM125's plus now I picked up a 81 YZ80 to mess with. Talk about too much stuff to do!

same here ive been trying to finish my '90 rm 125 restore since june but can not find the time to do it. I have boxes of new parts that i bought for it that are just sitting there.

Don't bother with the little suction type sandblasters, too much time to blast anything. Get a pressure pot type blaster. Way quicker! Use #4 or #5 sand to blast frames and other parts you are going to paint.

Find an automotive paint store and have them hook you up with a little reading material. PPG offers P bulletins. A few good paint products to have on hand from PPG would be their epoxy primer and catalyst. Good over all types of metals except magnesium. Does not have to be sanded if you paint over it within 7 days. Mix up what you need. Great stuff. Any automotive paint you use, just make sure it is a catalyzed enamel or urethane and you will be safe from any fliud spills or cleaners.

Cleaning different bare metals, use PPG DX579 metalprep for steel and PPG DX533 Alumiprep for aluminum. Those two products are great to have around. Use them diluted per directions and rinse clean with water.

Do not use a wire wheel on a drill or bench grinder to clean aluminum parts!!!!! Totally fucks up aluminum.

Those are a few that will get you started.

Some rims, even the silver ones are anodized. That can have an effect on cleaning them up. If not anodized use the alumiprep with a gray scotch brite pad to clean them. Use the scotch brite in one direction only so you keep the correct brushed finish. You can sand out and polish imperfections with aluminum polish. If they get too shiny, use the gray scotch brite to brush it back dull. Use 220 - 600 grit wet sand paper to remove imperfections before polishing.


Spokes? Buchanans stainless spokes. If there is no zinc on them to dull out, then they will never dull out! If you want to keep it original, pull all the spokes and have them clear zinc'd at a metal plating shop. They'll look new again. They do those usually as a minimum batch or by weight so make sure to send all of the bolts , axles and little brackets off the bike with them. Sure does add the final touch to a resto to have all the hardware bright again.

Any advise on anodized rims? This stuff is very helpfull! Thanks

Cleaning up anodized rims or any other anodized aluminum part. First off, if there are any imperfections, scratches or gouges that need to be sanded out or removed the anodizing needs to be removed first. If they are just discolored with no imperfections (not likely) you can just send them out to be re-anodized. The anodizing facility can strip the old color off and the aluminum will basically look new. Any imperfections can then be sanded out. If you are planning on leaving them silver, you may opt to not have them re-anodized. Just leave them bare. You have to finish the aluminum up to a point that it all has the same uniform appearance before having it anodized otherwise it will stand out in the new color. You can leave a nice brushed look on it or you can polish it up. I like a very light brushed finish that's been anodized. Excel rims would be an example of polished aluminum anodizing. Very glossy appearance to it. Probably not the answer you wanted to hear, but there really is nothing that can be done other than stripping and re-anodizing if it is colored.

Newman, I have taken oven cleaner to old rims to remove the anodized coating and then polished it with mothers ...came out very good.