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1969 Orange Krate is finished

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Nice work, glad I could be of some assistance along the way. It came out great and your investment is right on par for a nice original. The orange lines look great and nice job painting the front stripe.

That original tufted seat was a good $500 item, so certainly paid for some of your new parts. Enjoy the bike!
 
Thanks for the compliments guys.

I am rather surprised. There are so many super excellent Krates on this forum. Mine isn’t as flawless and beautiful as so many of yours are.
 
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Good job on restoration. Love the front superior striping
The tire painting was actually pretty easy.

I prepped the tire by cleaning the sidewall with acetone until the cloth came out clean.

I have a lot of experience with paint pens from using them in the workplace.
Some youtubers make them out to be a tricky, hard to use device. They’re not.

I bought what looked to be a higher quality brand instead of a cheapo one. No sense in saving a buck or two on a project like this.

I put the wheel axle in a vise to make it easier as I used the pen.
I had to paint about 2” sections at a time, and no, you can’t just touch the tip to the sidewall and spin the tire. Wish it was that easy but it’s not.

I used 3 coats, which ended up using more than one pen. I could have just done two coats and it would have looked good from casual glances. Up close though, it looked a bit thin so I felt it worthwhile to add the third coat. I also have almost a full second pen for future touch ups.

One thing to know, should anyone decide to do this, is that most paints like this are solvent on the underlying coat. In other words, even though the last coat may be dry, you can scrape through the dry coats to the surface rubber if you use the pointed tip and press too hard. Second and third coats need to be applied gently. You can’t just crayon the stuff.

But using the broad tip, with a gentle pressure, will cover without problems.

Also, you have to make sure the tip is wet. Paint pens allow paint flow through the tip via pressure on the spring action of the felt tip.

You have to prime these to even get the paint to flow initially. You have to keep doing this or the pen will stop dispensing paint. It isn’t like a sharpie where you can write a line a hundred yards long until it runs out of ink. The paint will stop flowing after a while unless you press the tip on a safe surface, (NOT WHAT YOU ARE PAINTING ON), and get the tip wet again. If you prime the tip on your work surface you will end up with a pool of paint where you didn’t want it!

It sounds more complicated than it is, but there are protocols for making theses pens work well.

I don’t know what the durability of this paint will be. The manufacturer advertises the ability to go through months of car washes on auto tires.

We shall see.

I am careful not to drag the tire sidewall on the ground or anything like that.

Here’s a close up to see the accuracy of the line.
1735651
 
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