Monster 900Sie 50000mile refresh.

[Mr Gazza]

Well it still doesn't look too bad from 5 yards, but the poor old girl is a bit battered when you look up close, and that's what I tend to do!

Hopefully this will document a long awaited refurb and become more interesting as it goes along. The bulk of it is just re-finishing various bits, which is pretty boring in itself, but I do have some little mods in mind.

I made a start this afternoon by draining the tank and lifting it off. I tipped it upside down to get the last drips out and heard a rattle. Upon investigation I found the detritus pictured below. Two pieces of gravel and three large lumps of some sort of resin. Presumably an attempt by a previous owner to cure a leaky hinge bracket?




One of the first jobs I did when I bought it 10 years ago was have the hinge properly brazed up and it's never leaked a drop.
I've checked the internal breather pipes and a guitar string will pass all the way through both of them, so no worries there. The external pipe and Y piece need replacing though.

I also pulled out a tank which I was going to spray yellow at one time, but I've had enough Yellow bikes now, they seem to be unlucky for me!
One breather is clear on that, but the other is blocked and I can't yet get the guitar string though, so that's soaking in WD40 for now , ready for another poke in a couple of days time. Probably should have gone with my rust eating crystals first? The WD40 might have been a bad idea and stop the rust eater doing it's job so well?

I hope I don't leave too long gaps between posts on here, but the next few months will be very busy for me, so I'll see what time I can find for the project.

[walkingpictures]

Good luck with this Gaz,will follow with interest.

Kimbo

[yellowfever]

Looking forward to this too. Good inspiration, as having finally got a garage I hope to be able to give my S2R some overdue TLC with a light refresh/few minor mods etc too, drawing on the wonderful advice and collective expertise of this forum…

[Mr Gazza]

I managed to get a few minutes this afternoon and gave that blocked tank breather tube a bit more attention.
Forget the WD40, it made no impact on the blockage. I mixed up a little Deox-C solution with hot water and found a small syringe, I also happened to have some needles which came as a surprise gift with the syringes. I was a bit annoyed about that at the time as they didn't know who they were sending needles too, but as it happens they have come in handy.
I soon realised that it was much easier to manoeuvre the syringe into the tank if it was only half full. I used the needle so I could get it right into the tube and avoid spilling the rust eater in the tank. a couple fillings revealed a puddle under the back of the tank, so liquid and air was able to pass the blockage, but I wanted it properly clear, so plugged the exit and filled the tube with Deox-C. I did a bit of wet rodding with the guitar string and made a few mm progress. unfortunately the string was not stiff enough to push when it reached the obstruction.
A rummage found me some .025 music wire left over from my modelling days. This is American in origin so I assume .025 is inches? And what we would call piano wire.
This immediately made a few mm progress and was stiff enough to hold with good pliers and really push. I got it going about 6mm at a time until it stopped dead again.
So I took the bung off the exit and tried to work the wire up from below. It was incredibly hard to get it round the 90 degree swept bend outside the tank but I forced it with pliers and managed to work to wire all the way through. I then kinked and hooked the end and pulled it right through with pliers and deemed it clear.
Next a few syringes full of clean water to rinse the Deox-c out, which also brought a lot of rust and bits with it. Then a few of clutch and brake cleaner which flushed even more dirty detritus. Finally a flush with WD40 to try and keep it from rusting again. Done.

Boring and tedious but one of those important jobs that needs to be done.
You really need to have the tank off for this and all the rubber hoses off too, so you can get in and really give it a seeing to. If I were not going to be stripping all the paint off, I would have wrapped the tank with bubble wrap and taped it round leaving the filler hole and breather exits clear.
Looking forward to some more interesting jobs.

[Mr Gazza]

Hopefully vaguely more interesting?
It obviously makes sense to determine the decal position before stripping the paint.
I have a method based on the way we used to mark out waterlines on boats, I've done a few of these on many from models to 31 footers, including tapered boot lines.
First step is to level the tank fore and aft and side to side using the filler cap as a level surface. (The filler cap is out, but the surround is the same.)

I had always assumed the decal was level with the ground. (or filler cap)
Much to my surprise they are miles out on the spare tank, which I assume to have an original paint job. The right hand decal on mine is level as expected, but the left tilts down to the front a long way. The "I" is the same height as the right. The tape is level in both shots.
All 4 decals also differ in for and aft position. Not that I'd accuse the Ducati paint shop of being a bit slap happy here, but..





For reference, the one I regard as correct in my opinion is 280mm from the bench top and level. It's 190mm from the radius of the panel rearwards and 100mm from the front radius.
When I mark out to position the new decals, or masks for spraying them, I will set the tank up like this again and run a chinagraph pencil along the top of a block @ 280mm minus half the diameter of the pencil to get the height and level. fore and aft can be measured from the panel radii and marked.

I will also be masking off the sticker which identifies the return and flow fuel pipes.
I have to chuckle at people who don't note these things before they take them apart, how hard can it be?

More poxy detritus was extracted after the tipping around of the tank, and another handful after I took this picture and another stone.



It beggars belief why people use this muck! It doesn't work, takes up room that petrol could use, adds weight, makes proper repairs more difficult causing problems for the future and wastes money. Other than that give it a go.

[Mr Gazza]

I wonder if anyone could recommend a paint stripper that works please?
They tend to be "safe" these days and wouldn't take the skin off a rice pudd'n, probably alright to drink though?

[utopia]

Unbelievable that those decals are so mismatched on either side.
Part of me wants to consider that this is somehow intentional in order to compensate for the eye being tricked when the bike is on the sidestand.
But the remaining sensible bit of my brain says that's bollox.
Unbelievable.

I'm guessing that the stones are left over from a previous owner trying to use them to remove internal rust before using the sealant.
Both were a bad idea.

The ally tank that I fitted to my Honda Dominator had a similar coating of resin sealant rattling about inside when I first bought it.

ps. I'll check the tank decals on my bike tomorrow and report back

[Mr Gazza]

I did momentarily wonder about side stand perspective myself, but none of the 4 decals is in the same place or angle, so dismissed the thought as nonsense like yourself.

Rather than level the tank and measure up, for a quick check you could measure down from a straight edge held across the cap.

But isn't your blue tank a respray of your Orange one anyway and not factory?

[utopia]

No, the blue tank was a factory original, bought to replace the orange one which took a dent when I thumbed the starter button while the bike was in gear on the sidestand (shortly after I had bypassed the sidestand cutout switch).
The bike lurched forward and toppled into a lampost.
Turned out to be a blessing in disguise though because I love the blue tank.
The other orange bits (seat cowl, mudguard, bellypan) were replaced with carbon, largely to avoid a costly respray.
That too was a blessing in disguise when I later managed to bag matching carbon wheels at a discount price.

[Jez900ie]

Just a thought, but do you think one side might have been repaired at some point? I guess you'll find out when you remove the paint.

[Mr Gazza]

There could well be something under the decal, as from the time I bought it, it has had a new decal clearly stuck over an old one on the left side. It's all fair and even lacquered over and no sign of paint touching up, so we'll find out when I strip it off.
That said the new decal is placed over the old (original?) one at the same angle and position and almost registers perfectly.

Dacs has been a star today and first footed me with a can of strong stripper gel.
I made an unfair swap of some Deox-C crystals, a syringe, a needle and a length of piano wire.
Good luck with your breathers Dacs and thank you for the stripper.

[Mr Gazza]

Grabbed another few minutes today, but still skirting round the edge really and not yet grasping the nettle.
I've rubbed some of the mirror chrome powder coating off the footrest hangers with my boots after 30k+ miles of all weather riding. The substrate is black and niggles me, but not really wanting the expense and bother of re-coating them, I thought I would try a cover up.




Initially I thought of getting some thin self adhesive stainless "Rub rails" laser cut, but I had the idea to try some aluminium tape today.
I've made a 1.5mm ply template for them which I can hand easily by flipping it over.
This is clamped over a piece of the tape on a bit of clean flat mdf. I then run a new Stanley blade carefully round the template to produce a little sticker with backing paper.
When this is very carefully applied it can be buffed up with Silvo formerly know as Duraglit. It rubs down very smooth and the edges go down nice and neatly.
I learned how to use this as a finish on model planes and it is really tricky to use, but can look okay if you're really careful and the substrate is smooth.
Bit of a bodge really, but we'll see how it lasts and if I can accept it.



Also rubbed my spare tank over with some 150 to give the stripper a start into the paint, but didn't commit to putting any stripper on.

[Nasher]

Looking Good Mr G.

The Black under the Chrome effect Powder coat is interesting, it could be some kind of Primer to get the full effect of the Chrome. The hangers themselves are of course cast Aluminium.
Perhaps they were Anodised or Powdercoated Black previously.

[Mr Gazza]

Well they were grit blasted to bare alloy prior to powder coating.
The mirror chrome coating is a multilayer process and has a black substrate.

[Mr Gazza]

It's been a heavy couple of days at work and it's raining, so getting in the bike shed takes a lot of willpower. But I've had some pots of Humbrol paint in the post and it seemed more appealing to play with those than larding more paint stripper on the tanks

Since I bought the bike there was evidence of a battery acid spill on the LH frame, only a small spot, but enough to niggle me. The alternator case had some too but that's been sprayed twice in my ownership and probably a third time is imminent.

The frame is metallic silver and I've often pondered having it powder coated with Mirror chrome or respraying it with another Silver or maybe Gold?
I don't really want a radical custom bike, I like most of the original features of the bike.
The silver would be hard to replicate I think and I do quite like the finish which is very good apart from the aforementioned blemishes.

I have successfully used Humbrol to touch up things in the past, the last time being the lovely Bronze colour of my Zero wheels using metallic No16 and gloss black.

I lined up the metallic Silvers and Met Black to make my palette.



Clean sticks for each colour and thoroughly mixed first.
I tried each Silver on the frame and then wiped off. They are all too bright and needed toning down with black. Met 56 showed most potential and was nearly there with the right amount of black, but seemed to lack something, so I added a little Gold Met 16 and it was near enough spot on.



Next to thoroughly clean the wound and carefully touch in the colour with a tiny brush and a strong light. Near enough invisible, but obviously you can see it in the photo with the lens about an inch from it! I think this will do me, but I'll check tomorrow and polish it up to see if I've saved myself a frame strip and respray.