New Bike, New Paint! With the purchase of a second 1st generation KLR (documented here), it was time to customize it. Truthfully, I probably would have left it stock green, as I like that paint scheme, but someone had painted the front fairing black and I couldn't leave it like that. Sure, I could have bought a new one off e-bay, but where's the fun in that? Ideas were tossed around. I was partial to painting it like my '00 KLR, but someone brought up the Swiss Army knife. After all, that's pretty much what the KLR is: not dedicated towards any one thing, but good at lots of little things. Let me edit that: it's very good at giving me a grin on my face. So here's the painting of the '01. I used the knowledge I had from painting the '00 and tried to make it work in my garage. |
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What she looked like while
still living in Phoenix. Looks good and shiny - not at all what a KLR
should look like! |
The inspiration for the new paint scheme on the '01 |
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| Like most bikes, the KLR is dead ugly without her skin. I am taking advantage of this nakedness to install heated grips and replace the instrument lights with LEDs | My neighbor asked m who the "kill booth" was for. I guess it does look a little weird. But it keeps the spray from getting all over the garage and the dust off the new paint. |
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I chose Krylon
Fusion paints for the base coats. It bonds amazingly well to the
plastic. Inside surfaces would be flat black, outer surfaces are getting
a base coat of white. |
Hard to imagine that the KLR can
look even uglier than it does normally. |
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Starting on the red |
The bike (minus the tank) |
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Tank, ready to go |
I painted the inside surfaces black
before I did the outer white/red coats |
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Lacquered vs un-lacqured |
Shiney! |
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Decal on the tank (yes, I know that
I didn't smooth out the original decal edges) |
Tail piece and front fender on.
Tank and seat "sort of" on |
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The tank is there for position only.
It's currently being lacqured. |
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