Paint vs PowderCoat

[KJP]

I am kicking around the idea of painting my frame and then taking everything back apart next winter to powder coat it.

This way I can add brackets as I see fit and make changes easily without having to worry about the powder coat.

Anyone see any potential issues with taking it back apart outside of me deciding it looks good enough and isn't worth the extra effort aka general lazyness?

 

[George]

You can repair your powder coat with out redoing the complete frame. Check out Tech Line coatings, they have a liquid that will mix with your powder that can be spayed on as a liquid, let dry then with a heat gun cure the repaired area.
Liquipowder . I have done two parts with the liquipowder and it matched perfectly. Use the same powder as used on chassis. Chassis was done in Texas, subframe here buy a coating shop and the steering wheel mount and rear tie rod mound done by me.

Brad

 

[AleX1/9]

+1 for powdercoating

Do you really want to remove and re-do the coolant hoses through the frame? I wouldn’t!

Also, the tubing is thick enough to drill and tap for light duty attachments / brackets or you could use clamps

Painting the whole thing is a lot of work to have to re-do also. If there is one thing I’ve learned from my years of restoring and customizing, it’s to make sure you never have to do the same job twice

 

[JSATX]

Having used rustoleum is my #1 regret. The rock chips are insane.

Now we can flip that on its head because I don’t know the duribailty of the powdercoat. And had I done that and it got chipped as well that would be much worse than paint getting chipped. So take that for what it’s worth

An hour drive and I’ll remove literally a handful of asphalt pebbles from the seats. Maybe fenders would help that but I don’t know by how much.

 

[Briann1177]

One of the problems with paint is that when it chips by a rock or whatever, the chip area will be larger than if the same rock hit a powdercoat finish.

Powder coat is very tough. I've dropped parts on the floor and not even a scratch. It's the only way to go IMO.

 

[Andy]

I painted my chassis but that was due to lack of powder coaters in the area. The two i called were wanting ridiculous prices for just the chassis with a 3 month lead time from receiving the chassis. Guy on the phone told me they pretty much set the prices and he hated tube chassis and basically only does high end restoration types of builds. If you have access i would powder coat it.

 

[ctuinstra]

My son's quad is powder coated and it takes a heck of a beating on the track! The front a-arms are just now starting to show wear from the constant barrage of rocks and dirt. It was a no-brainer for me, especially since my coaster is just down the road and another 5 miles away. Just haven't had really good luck with paint durability.