Painted frame

Its been a while since i posted any updates on my blog.  This is partly because I've been so busy with work I haven't really had much time to get my teeth into any proper jobs on the bike.  I have managed to grab a moment here and there to work on bits and pieces but until I have completed something it seems a little pointless to be writing about it.

However, in order to keep something rolling along, I did take my frame, front forks, rear swinging arm and a few ancillaries in for painting a few weeks ago.  I was concerned that I might be being a little premature with this, but as the frame really didn't need much re-work, I thought getting it painted would at least be progress of some sort (and could be happening without my involvement while I was busy elsewhere)

I decided that I would get the scooter powder-coated (rather than wet-sprayed) as I am lead to believe that Manurhin scooters were indeed one of the earliest adopters of electrostatic powder-coating for motorcycles.  As I had already used (and was very pleased with) Redditch Shotblasting for my powder coating when I was rebuilding my Vespa it was natural that I would go back to them.  I phoned them up and arranged to drop the parts into them the following day.  When I arrived at their unit in Redditch, Dave came out to meet me "Oh its you" he said, sounding a little miffed "I didn't realise it was you when we were talking on the phone"
I was a little taken aback by his reaction to seeing me, and I asked what he meant.
It turns out that Dave had read my blog about the Vespa rebuild and was a little concerned about the 'bad' press I had given him.
Well, my first thought was "Wow, someone actually reads my blog?!" but then I quickly panicked wondering what on earth I could have said that was bad.  Not only do I try to avoid writing 'bad' things about people, but I thought I had expressed my delight with their work.  I don't need to explain my writing here - but to cut a long story short, He was gutted because he thought I'd written a bad review about his company, and I was gutted because he had interpreted my writing as a bad review when actually it wasn't.  Anyway, I think we are friends again and for the record I think Redditch Shotblasting do a marvelous job and I thoroughly recommend them (just remember that all good thing come to those who wait.  I waited patiently this time for the job to be done (3.5 weeks) and once again, I was delighted with the end result)

I had initially decided that the frame should be black - I think all chassis' should be gloss black - but talking it through with Dave and looking at his very extensive range of colours, I changed my mind at the last moment and decided to have it coloured as near as damn it to the original colour of the bike - Maroon.  I say original because as I have already discussed on this blog, I'm not 100% sure what the 'original' colour actually was.
As much as I like a black chassis, I am very pleased that I chose the Maroon in the end - it looks fabulous

Frustratingly - exactly the same as when I picked up the painted Vespa frame - I have to leave the Manurhin frame wrapped in its bubble wrap for a couple of weeks now while I jet off for work.
But at least I have something exciting to be getting on with over the Christmas holidays :-)

By the way - Did I mention that I think Redditch Shot-blasting and Powder-coating do a great job ;-)