man, i blew it. i am so fond of the factory KHS fade job, but my paint is trashed. i got a more suitable fluted SR track post, but when i tried to remove my old seatpost, trouble happened. penetrating oil didn't cut it. drilling a hole in the post and whaling on it with my slide hammer didn't cut it. crushing it in a vise and twisting/pulling/hammering didn't cut it. after two days of sweat and frustration, i did what i knew i had to do... i put a little heat on it. with a torch. at first, i tried just a little heat, then went to town with the slide hammer. i was getting extremely nervous about ruining my precious frame. so i went past the point of no return- i gave it enough heat to cook the paint off. the seatpost finally slid free. my frame is fine, but my paint around the seat tube/top tube/seatstay junction is gone. so it's time to sandblast and treat it to a nice, new paint job.

so, my theme has been blue/black/chrome. i thought it would look good with a flat black enamel, but that would be too subtle for my semi-exotic frame. i want that curvy seat tube to stand out, not my chromy stuff. the frame is the centerpiece, it must make a statement.

so the question is... what to do? some suggestions please. snarkiness is expected, but one or two serious replies would be nice...

before the disaster- i don't want to change my new bar tape or chainring, but in the name of bling:

Dude.

Trans-Am.

You KNOW it.

Trans Am blue for sure, but see if you can get that huge bass boat style metal flake.

at this early stage its looks like its trans-am blue. But whats the go with the wavy seat tube? It looks neat.

No pink option? Is pink not cool anymore?

go flu snot!!!!

I've GOT a flu snot green bike (albeit its my geared one) and its awesome!!

Go flu snot green!!

you better be careful.. id vote for the purple just becasue it made me laugh the hardest

everything should be metalic blue.

Wheres the vote for 2tone? Ska wha?

to bad it's not lugged, this is my new fav color scheme

baby**** brown

Just had a crazy idea... What if you chrome the seattube and paint the rest? It'd look friggin' sweet, sorta repeating the vertical chrome line of the fork, and make it stand out that you have a straight fork and a curved seattube. I guess you'd have to chrome the whole frame and then paint over that, masking off the seattube. You could leave the headtube chrome as well, and get a polished seatpost. Blue frame would be nice.

So how crazy am I?

I have the same frame...and had the same paint job that was beat to hell. So I sent it for bead blasting and figured I could decide what color it was to be while it was gone....nope. Changed my mind so many times, I ended up having it clearcoated so I could ride/protect it. Anyway here is what your frame would look like clear:



Maybe some photoshop guhrus out there could do a color job on the pic?

And a weird question regarding your frame...do you have 2 small holes in your frame? One on the left side of the down tube, and one on the lower part of the seat tube? These look to have been done by the factory as maybe a guide hole for a cable stop and f. derailleur braze mount?

no, my frame has no holes in it other than the tiny weld vents on the insides of the stays near the track forks. there is a wierd little boss on the back side of the head tube that i can't figure out, other KHS tracks have them, too. they did make more than one version of this frame from what i understand. i think mine is a 1994, you can send the s/n to KHS for dating.

lofarkas' idea is something to think about...

i also got some killer info on powdercoating, more to think about...

i think i'm leaning to trans am metallic blue...

five days without my fixie is an eternity. commuting with derailleurs and 175's just doesn't feel the same.

some good ideas here, i'll let this thread go a little longer. maybe later i'll post a pic of the flame damage.

Cmon, you're in Reno. Is there anything but Trans-am blue?

You know you want it...

Well, I know I want to see what it looks like.

Am i the only one who would think green is cool?
edit- i guess not.

Orange

+1 pink

you've got a point there...

on that note, i'm daydreaming about going metallic blue, with white-trimmed silver banding on the head tube, seat tube, and stays. it would be kinda wolfpack, but i'd get mad local cred. i gotta photochop that when i get home late tonight...

and heath pinter was the only rider ever cool enough to strut pink.

how about this:

I'd get pink. Just sayin'.

trans-am blue is totally winning... yesss