Originally Posted by
f0ca
Alright, I bought it. Any advice on stripping the old paint and repainting? I sandblasted and powdercoated my beater a while ago, but I don't think it's a good idea here. I'm worried that sandblasting is going to take off too much material from the already thin tubes. And powder coating is too thick, so the lugs will disappear.
You probably took your beater to the wrong powder coat shop. Any steel frame should hold up to a thorough media blasting unless the guy uses the wrong media and with too heavy a hand. If he uses the right media, he won't take anything off but the old finish. As far as the old saw about powder coatings being too thick, that can certainly happen, but if your powder coater is a good one, he can control how thick he applies it and give you good results.
I've done the full chemical strip and home respray with good results, but it was a
ton of work and the resulting finish, although it looks nice, is lot more delicate than a PC. I think I spent about $70 on stripper, primer, paint, solvents etc, and about 10 hours of my time. I didn't mind too much, as I wanted the experience of doing it myself. In contrast, my blast & PC job at the local powder coater was $135 and zero hours of my time, apart from dropping it off and picking it up. A real bargain, if you value your time at all.
