I've recently bought a '95 Marin Indian Fire Trail and unfortunetly the frame is suffering from quite a bit of corrosion underneath the lacquer. My plan was to try and remove the lacquer with nitromors and then rub down the frame with wet and dry paper working though the grades to remove any pitting to the metal work. I've tried it on a small section of the top tube and then used some autosol to bring it up to a mirror finish. However the finish although looking good, is very very easily scratched (even the plastic cover on the brake cable scores nasty looking scratches into the surface. Should I attempt to re-lacquer the frame once rubbed down or am going to have problems in years to come with corrosion under the lacquer? I was thinking of using car wheel lacquer such as POR15 Glisten, as it’s a two pack lacquer (much harder than normal lacquer) and is designed for polished aluminium.
Polished aluminium frames
- Thread starter gurmaster
- Start date
jimihendrix
MacRetro Rider
Not sure about the POR15 but if it's made for alloy wheels it'd probably work, i do know that normal rattle can laquers wont work, it'll just go yellow and look horrible.
Getting the frame clear anodised would be good but may be costly.
I've polished quite a few frames and just left them bare, my current main bike (Orange E3) was done a while ago and still looks great, have to keep polishing it though but i dont mind that, i find for the light scratches from cables and carrying the bike when it's been muddy etc a Brillo soap pad works best followed by the Autosol, major problem i found was commuting on it in the winter when the salt was on the roads, had to stop using it as the salt was eating into the frame .
Getting the frame clear anodised would be good but may be costly.
I've polished quite a few frames and just left them bare, my current main bike (Orange E3) was done a while ago and still looks great, have to keep polishing it though but i dont mind that, i find for the light scratches from cables and carrying the bike when it's been muddy etc a Brillo soap pad works best followed by the Autosol, major problem i found was commuting on it in the winter when the salt was on the roads, had to stop using it as the salt was eating into the frame .
FairfaxPat
Senior Retro Guru
I have a polished 1991 Funk that I polish with medium fine steel wool and soapy water to a chrome like finish, then I apply a good coat of car wax to protect the shine, then repeat every 3 months or so. About 4 polish jobs a year-kinda like a car with nice paint.....
