Painting Plastics?

[mrfixit63740]

I need some advise on this Krylon Fusion paint. I have a 1983 YT 175 Tri-Moto that I am trying to fix up that I bought for a $100.00. It was sitting in a barn for about 10 years. I have tried sanding and painting but when i went to put my clear coat on it started to wrinkle in the places where the plastic commonly flexes. If anyone has any advise what I can do to restore the looks of this old yellow beater I would greatly appreciate it! The plastics are really in good shape for the most part but I want them to look a little closer to new if you catch my drift. I have seen some pics of a couple of yellow tri-motos on here that look really good, I wonder what they did? I CAN'T FIND THESE FENDERS NEW! PLEASE HELP!

[lookinforone]

is the clear coat the Fusion paint as well?
if it is it shouldnt wrinkle. if its not, dont use it. you could possibly use gloss yellow
and that should look pretty good.

[crd00]

You have to put a coat of primer for plastics on underneath the basecoat(before you spay the colour), then you spray on your clear coat so it wont rinkle and the paint will bend when your plastics bend. You have to use the same name clear as your paint or it wont go on right and your paint job will be runined

[mrfixit63740]

No it is 500 degree clear coat from wal-mart. I figured the higher temp stuff would work better since it might sit outside for now. I have a quad that gets first dibs on storage. I couldn't find any fusion clear and I think part of the problem might be the temp that it was out at the time. I don't have any place inside to do this work right now. The temp was prolly somewhere around 45-55 degrees with low humidity and the sun was out. The can says 50-80 degrees is optimal. Paint alone was looking great berore the clear though!

[mrfixit63740]

Primer? Even though the Fusion paint says it doesn't need one?

[crd00]

Ya it proably does say no primer but on metal you wouldnt have to but with plastics its better to use the primer for plastics, because if you dont your paint job wont turn out as good and it will rinkle as you said

[crd00]

I do it all the time with my fenders

[mrfixit63740]

Well crap, I guess i'll have to strip and sand it back down then. I never found any plastic primer. Any ideas where you can get it or who makes it?
Thanks.

[mrfixit63740]

So it works good on your plastics? What kind of primer do you use? Is it made specifically for plastic?

[crd00]

it come in a spray bomb, autocolour makes it, you should be able to buy it at any autobody shop

[crd00]

yup its just for plastics, bodyshops use it on plastic bumpers on cars, plastic door mouldings etc. I use it all the time when I paint them

[mrfixit63740]

Thanks alot! I will try to find some and see what happens. If I ever get this thing done I will put up some pics but that might be awhile the stupid weather doesn't want to cooperate, lol.

[YTM200BOY]

lol good luck man its snowing in march up here in illinios w.t.f is this all about lol.. Yeah man this summer im painting my ytm200EK hopefully it looks a bit odd with a 225dx black front fender lol i want to make mine bright yellow also. so hay if you can do me a favor when you do yours tell me what you use and tell me how it turns out k? well thanks man and good luck! -Joe

[Yamahauler]

Dont waste your time with paint. Especially for yellow fenders. The best, easiest way to do it is to take a razer blade. Hold it perpindicular (90 degrees) to the plastic and scrap back and forth with a little pressure, it should take off a fine shaving of plastic. underneath, it looks brand new, the plastic will still be scratched, but its not bad, and since its yellow plastic, you can hardly see the scratches. If you are really worried about scratches, start wet sanding, from 600 to 2000 grit, then use rubbing compound and finally some kind of glaze or car wax. But I think with just scraping with the razer blade, you will be quite surprised what that brown coating of rotted plastic was hiding.

Do no hold the razer blade at any other angle other than 90 degrees, you will gouge into the plastic and it looks like crap, I did it in a couple places on my fenders.

Here are my fenders before and after, this is razer blading, then hours of wet sanding. Turned out PERFECT!!

[YTM200BOY]

yeah man looks nice i sanded and scrapped my rear fender and it looks beautiful also... but my front fender is black and i tried scrathing it and it looks really bad. Also i think i am going to throw out my gas tank cover because there are cracks on both sides. lol so yeah and my front light plastic is garbage also.