About Me

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Henry Martin spends his nights writing fiction and poetry, which predominately deals with the often-overlooked aspects of humanity. He is the author of three novels: Escaping Barcelona, Finding Eivissa, and Eluding Reality; a short story collection, Coffee, Cigarettes, and Murderous Thoughts; and a poetry collection, The Silence Before Dawn. His most recent published project is a collection of Photostories in five volumes under the KSHM Project umbrella, for which he collaborated with Australian photographer Karl Strand, combining one of a kind images with short stories and vignettes. He is currently working on his next novel narrated in two opposing points of view. He lives with his family in the Northeast.

Monday, March 20, 2017

Painting Givi Motorcycle Luggage - Part 3

Moving along with this project.

In part 3, I'm finally getting to the painting stage.

The cases were wetsanded with 220 grit paper and washed with Dawn dish detergent to remove some of the contaminants. Unfortunately, water was still beading up, so the surface was not ready to accept paint.

SEM came to the rescue with their Scuff and Clean product

After washing the cases with this the first time, there was a noticeable improvement in wettability (yes, not a real word, but it means whether the surface can be wetted), with few spots still beading up. After the second wash, the cases remained nice and wet all over.

Next step was taping. I did not want the new paint to get damaged when putting the case on and off the racks, so I left the back contact area stock black plastic. The same applies to the hinges and the feet on which the cases stand when removed. There is no sense in doing a good paint job only to have it chip in the inevitable contact areas, which will then introduce a way for water to seep in and damage the paint. So, masking tape and a razor blade it was. I also taped the lip that interlocks when the cases are closed.

Once the cases were all taped up, I wiped them clean with SEM Plastic Prep to remove any leftover contaminants from the surface. At this point, I was wearing gloves to prevent contaminating the surface. Three separate wipes later, the cases were ready.

A note - wiping the Polypropylene gave it a nice static charge - and the cases became an instant magnet for any airborne dust, hair, et cetera. Blowing it off with a compressor did not do a thing, so I wiped it down again with a lint free tack cloth.

Two coats of SEM XXX adhesion promoter later, I was ready to apply some high build sandable primer to provide a paintable  substrate for my base coat. But before color painting, the cases need to be sanded smooth to remove the ugly Givi texture.

Will continue.

Saturday, March 18, 2017

Painting Givi Motorcycle Luggage - part 2

Part 2 of the Givi Polypropylene saga.

At this point, I have attempted to sand the texture of the polypropylene cases down a bit before painting. The first attempt was made with Dawn dish detergent and 400 grit wet / dry sandpaper. I like sanding under water - the results are more consistent and there is no dust. The 400 grit, however, did not make a bite in the textured finish. So, I moved on to 220 grit, which produced slightly better results. Well, it knocked the contamination down enough, but most of the texture stayed.






One of the cases had some road rash on the lower corner I wanted to fix.

 After cleaning it with SEM Plastic Prep solvent, I decided to try another SEM Product
Mini-Max Bumper Repair epoxy, which is made for Polypropylene. SEM suggests grinding the damaged area with 24 grit sandpaper. Not having any around, I used a wood rasp to create grooves in the damaged area, which was then wiped down with the Plastic Prep.


This epoxy mixes easily, and is very sticky right after mixing. Working time is about 5 minutes, so do not mix large batches. With a plastic putty knife, I applied the epoxy into the damaged area, making sure I would have a plenty of excess material to be able to sand it smooth. By the way, before the epoxy cures, it has a tendency to run a little - much like JB Weld.





Once cured, I knocked it down with the 220 paper and feathered the edges in.
The epoxy stays put in place, and cured is pretty flexible. I had some leftover on the putty knife, and even bending the edge did not crack or separate the epoxy from the knife. I'm very confident it will stay on the prepped polypropylene case.

Next step is one final wash before getting ready for primer.




Thursday, March 16, 2017

Painting Givi Motorcycle Luggage - part 1

This will be a multi-post saga documenting my journey in painting Givi Luggage for my Bandit 1200S.

Intro:

For the past couple of years, I've been searching for a good way to mount a set of Givi sidecases and a top case on my 2002 Suzuki Bandit 1200S. Unfortunately, Givi discontinued the only strong rack I had liked - the Wingrack 2 - for this bike. The newer tubular style racks are just not soild enough to make me comfortable mounting them.

A couple of weeks ago, I finally found a used Wingrack 2 for my bike. The seller would not sell it to me alone, and insisted on me purchasing his luggage set with it, so I ended up with my beloved Wingrack 2, two E36 side cases, and a V46 top case.

While the top case is in a really good shape, the side cases are not. There are some scratches, some UV damage, and a corner that took a hit, leaving a deep gauge.

I almost pulled the plug on ordering a set of new E41, which I had on my previous Bandit 1200S, but then I looked at the shape of the E36 cases, and actually liked their squareness. The black, however, makes them look bulkier than they really are, especially against my white bike.

So, the decision was made to paint the cases a matching color.

Problems:

I ordered some matching paint, an adhesion promoter, and catalyzed clear to get the job done. The plan was to proceed the same way I painted many other plastic pieces in the past - clean, scuff, paint.

But alas, it is not to be this easy. The lid on the V46 is ABS plastic, so that one is easy, however, looking inside the E36 cases, I found the plastic recycling code - Polypropylene.

Crap. For those not familiar with Polypropylene, it is one of the group of plastics known for Low Surface Energy. In other words, like the nonstick Teflon coating in your kitchen pots, nothing sticks to it. Well, not really nothing, it is just much harder to achieve good adhesion.

Polypropylene cannot be wetted, which really means that water, adhesives, and paints bead up on the surface. Not exactly a quality one looks for when painting these things. Nevertheless, thanks to science, I should be able to overcome this problem.

And this is where the cost vs benefit ratio leaves the realm of reason, and my stubbornness takes over.

The plan:

Test various adhesion promoters to see which one works. Spray with high build primer, sand smooth, shoot with base color, and finish with 2k clear.

So far, I wetsanded the cases with 400 grit paper using Dawn dish liquid to degrease the plastic. That did nothing except to make my tub dirty. The UV damaged layer came off nicely, but the beading continued. I tried some Prep-All, and some Lacquer Thinner to degrease the parts, but again with no success.

So, I wetsanded the cases with 220 grit, removing a little more plastic, and leveling the surface. It worked wonders on the ABS lid, but the Polypropylene is so resilient that it does not seem to be affected much.

My next step is to go to the store and buy some SEM Scuff and Clean product to see if it makes any difference.