Did anybody know you could do THIS?

OK, so the ignition cover (LH) on my '81 550 has some scrapes and gouges, so I picked up a cover off eBay and was getting ready to refurbish it. Masked off the YICS to try to preserve it while doing the paint-remover stage and discovered this. This opens up a whole new realm of possibilities...

 

hahaha..you could put alot of stuff in there...

 

like lead

 

Man I had no Idea - I want to restore mine - thanks fitz!

 

You could put other things in there, like KFC or LOL?

 

I like the YICS badge in Red. Mine have faded.

Maybe I can have a plate milled with my initials - that would be cool. (at least to me) :lol:

 

I knew they came off, I tried and bent the badge getting it off. At least it was the bad one. I had another that I soaked in WD40 for a few days to soften the glue, that worked great. I polished the cover and put in the good YICS badge with some double sided trim tape. Looks like new now

 

Now that I know this, I will be "rescuing" them from scuffed and gouged covers, as well as removing another good one to refurb its cover without damage to it. I have a couple of covers that have the YICS plate all scuffed and scratched too (it's apparently brass) I'm gonna try refurbing a couple by stripping, smoothing, and spraying with red engine enamel and then coming back and filling in the flat black area. I'll post some pics if they turn out.

 

Fitz, I think you maybe better off the other way around.
Paint it black then you could roll the red on the high spots.
Or fill a sponge with red and lightly press the YICS badge down on it.
Just a thought.

 

Yeah, I was gonna try it both ways and see which came out better. I have successfully used a cut-up foam stamp from the craft store to repaint the lettering on an instrument cluster, that would probably work too.

 

imo you should paint it all red, let that dry then paint it all black and lightly wipe off the red letters with a soft rag and a little solvent

 

Yeah, that was my original thought too; especially if I use engine enamel for the red, be sure its 100% cured and use low-gloss black touch-up paint for the black. I suspect that's how Yamaha did it. We'll see; I've got two covers that are so badly gouged as to be unusable so I'm gonna steal their YICS plates to experiment with (they're scuffed up anyway) and we'll see what comes out better. I'll post pics.

 

replacement mirrors make good badge covers.(hehe) They look cool painted or covered.

 

That's cheating!! I like it !!

 

Ummm... It's a good thing you were wearing shorts when you took that picture of your mirror side cover, RDB. :lol:

 

holy cr@p rdbhere2! How'd you get your engine so shiney?!
I'd have to throw a tarp over mine if I parked anywhere near you. :?

 

I refinished my side covers this summer to get rid of the corrosion on them, and I need ideas on what to use to remount the YICS badges. Corrosion had started in the recess around the badge so I didn't want to use double sided trim tape. Has anyone tried embedding the badge in black silicone?? I was afraid of trying something and it failing from the heat and losing the badge. By the way a green Scotchbrite leaves a nice brushed look to the aluminum. Thanks again for all the info you guys have provided on his site.

 

--holy cr@p rdbhere2! How'd you get your engine so shiney?!

Either he's got a lot of time on his hands, or has a secret spray can that works so well. Sure wish I could get mine looking like that. I must say the mirrors on the covers is a cool idea.........I will probably steal it! What did you use to attach them so they don't let go with the block heat?

dave

 

Gray scotchbrite is finer yet, you can get it in the "paint" aisle at Home Depot or Lowes. I thought about glueing them back in with black adhesive RTV, but ended up going with automotive molding tape after all. I'm making some progress on the "badge restoration" project may have some results later today.

 

I had the same delemna with my side covers. They were extremely scratched and faded. I took them off and sanded them with 320 grit wet sand paper, then followed up with 500 grit and finally 100 grit paper. Then I took them to the buffer (in my drill press) and polished them with a three-step polishing process that ended up turning them into chrome. They keep the chrome shine with a little soft cloth and some polish a couple times a year.
You can polish aluminum with polishing compound to get the same results with a little time and one of those cheep buffer pads that mount in your drill or drill press.
I've been asked where I got them "chromed" they are that shiny.
They kind show up on this photo:

 

My youngest son sculpts goblins, orcs and skulls from super sculpty. Kind of War Hammer like creatures. It's like plastisene, but it's 2 part epoxy. I'm going to give him my covers,tank and fenders and have him cover them in creatures. It should be different!