Painting advice

[dirtymoosetaint]

here is a picture of my scooter (not actually mine but same model and color) now i am thinking of painting all the black pieces chrome, but a friend said chrome flakes after awhile. my next option is a metallic silver.

do you think it would look ok with either of those, also I am waiting on my blue led's that i bought on ebay i figured the chrome look with blue led's would be neat..

[aeroxbud]

If your lucky someone might be able to do it in photo shop for you.

[dirtymoosetaint]

lol i did last night lol my wife is really good with photoshop cuz shes a photographer so i played with it last night and honestly they both seems ok its just hard to decide based on a picture and not in real life lol but i went out on my lunch break and bought some paint so im gonna do it before i go to work tomorrow

[moore716]

anytime you paint over plastick that has a pebble grain you need to sand the crap out of it for it look correct. You basically need to sand it all smooth. If you dont the other option is to put a lot of coats of color over it, but you still need to do some sanding first and foremost. next you should paint it with bulldog adhesion promoter. Follow the instructions on the can. After that use a good automotive spray primer. I use duplicolor and its worked fine so far. If the primer comes out rough you can lightly sand it with like 1000 grit paper. Next lay down your color in numerous light coats. You want complete thick coverage but its gonna take lots of paint to get there. If you get runs or sags stop and let them dry before sanding them out. After you are happy with the base coat get some 1500-2000 grit wet sand paper. Just fold the paper up into squares and dip it into a bucket of water. Lightly glide the paper all over the plastic. Dont push it let it slide and flow. Be very careful of edges you will sand right thru them. Now your paint is gonna look like shit. All dull and scratchy looking. Hose it down with mild soap and water. Do a nice rinse and towel dry it. Make sure its clean and free of anymarks or water spots. Now carefully lay down the clear. In nice light coats. You dont want mistakes here take your time. use duplicolor clear for this as well. The crappy thing is that true automotive clear has a hardener in it and the spray can stuff does not.

[jmkjr72]

and if any one used any sort of renew product or armor all on any of the black parts
you have to make sure you get all that off before you can even think about putting a primer on
when i did the red on my zuma i used the duplicolor adhsion promoter and then there primer and paint no clear

and metalics are real hard to paint it is real easy to get tiger stripes in the paint
you have to make sure the gun is at the exact same distance from the part on each pass and you dont do one pass slower or faster then the other

[dirtymoosetaint]

so i stripped my front plastic peice that i spilled brake fluid on now it has a stickyness to it...should i use like a 800 grain sand paper?

[moore716]

well it has to dry before you do any sanding or your just gunna make gum balls. Anyway depending on how rough it is you could go down to 250 and work your way up to 1000 so that it's nice and smooth.