I asked Steven Bilenky about it once, and he said there was a way to do it that was as sound as normal powder, involving (as I recall) some kind of specialized clear primer. But I might be wrong about that; in any case, I decided not to do it, as I live much of the year in the functional equivalent of "a sugar shack on the Chesapeake" (a house right on the Intracoastal Waterway on the Jersey Shore). But I have to say, the best looking bike I ever owned was my first one from Riv, a clear-coated Bombadil. It was a perfect finish (aesthetically) for the Bomba's utilitarian look. You could even see the tube numbers marked in pencil (or whatever) under the clear! Too cool.
From: rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com [mailto:rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Grant @ Rivendell Sent: Friday, March 18, 2016 12:21 PM To: RBW Owners Bunch Subject: [RBW] CLEARCOAT o'er baremetal & why we don't do it anymore I am not fluent here and tried to respond to other comments about it, then gave up and thought I could do it here & this way...wondering all the while whether this is what "thread thwacking" is. Anyway, this isn't the last word on it, just our experience and observations. It looks best and the way you want it to look if the frame is not blasted after building. Then you get the fire marks and general variegation that gets the blood flowing. If the frame is blasted after building and you clear coat over that, it looks like boring metallic gray with some brass-colored pinstriping (if lugs). Nobody will say hey, cool; they'll just think, hey, kinda boring. Clear coat is porous, which means water gets thru it and causes rust. We had a local powder coater assure us that it had an ultranew and supereffective way to protect the metal from rust, but it didn't work. Inland bikes, no big problem, but if you live in a sugar shack on Chesapeake Bay, it won't last. Powder coating, wet painting, no matter. Powder coating isn't the "bulletproof, no-nonsense, thanks for not making me have to think about anything" solution it is sometimes portrayed as. It was developed for thick steel tractors, as a durable, chip-resistant layer. The proble, besides being pourous, is that with powder there is no primer to help fight rust and protect the metal when it does chip. And powder coatings tends to have more micro-cracks than wet paint. When the paint is opaque, it's easy to assume all's well underneath, but when it's clear, you can actually see what's happening. If clear-coating was a GREAT idea, we'd offer it. It's used on show bikes sometimes as a novelty and to show how great the metal looks, but if the air is humid or salty or it rains a lot or something like that, it's not fantastic...in our experience here, at least. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com<mailto:rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com>. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. ________________________________ The sender of this email is a retired partner of Skadden Arps and is not performing legal service on behalf of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP & Affiliates. Use by a retired partner of the skadden.com or probonolaw.com domain names is in his/her personal capacity and not on behalf of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP & Affiliates. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
