Rosy glow in a BR tin
Scooter painting is an art – but if attempted at home with untested primer, it may not go to plan
Everyone wanted their scooter to look the best and while some could afford top paint jobs done by professionals, most of us would carry out a respray at home. The problem with a shop doing it wasn’t just cost, it also meant you were off the road for a few weeks and transporting it there and back in your dad’s Ford Cortina was a logistical nightmare.
There were two ways to tackle spraying it yourself, either by rattle cans or using one of those professional spray kits advertised in the Sunday newspapers. The ad always sounded good: ‘Get a professional paint finish in your garage with this super spray gun’ and ‘No more expensive costs to get your paintwork gleaming’. The reality was that it was simply a tarted-up garden weed sprayer with a bit of extra piping. The instant you started using it the bloody thing would clog up and deposit big clumps of paint on the bodywork. Far from a ‘professional paint finish’, it looked like something a four-year-old had done. Rattle cans were the obvious choice but the biggest problem was where to do the job.
My old man’s garage was out of the question as five minutes of a spray can could fill the house with fumes for months on end. I’d tried it outside on the washing line, but it was either a case of raindrops ruining the finish or the small flies that once you started spraying seemed to be attracted to paintwork like bees to honey. Most of the time these were encapsulated in the paint and after a light rub down became part of the finish for the rest of the scooter’s life. I struck lucky when my dad lost interest in growing tomatoes and I inherited a first-class paint shop in the form of the now disused greenhouse. It was ideal as I could hang the frame and panels from the steel supports in the roof and the windows opened to vent the poisonous fumes. The finish wouldn’t impress anyone at the nearby Bentley factory, but for old Lambrettas, the results were acceptable.
My friend Eddie was keen to get his Jet 200 spruced up just like everyone else – and it was hardly surprising thanks to every panel being a different colour. With the addition of odd wheels and hubs he could have passed it off as a Technicolour Dreamcoat tribute scooter, but he just wanted it all white. Nothing fancy, just all the same shade. The frame and a few other bits had been powder coated and rather than trying to remove it he decided to sand it with woodworking sandpaper. It was the wrong type and far too coarse, but he spent a whole weekend on it, producing a finish with scratches so deep the frame resembled a piece of wood. Now that his version of prep was completed it was time to get the primer on but rather than go for the traditional grey type he turned up with something else instead.
His father worked for British Rail and anything that wasn’t bolted down found its way back to their house. The bathroom mirror, knives and forks – you name it, all had ‘BR’ stamped on them. This also included the tin of red oxide primer that Eddie had turned up with. Everything outside their house was painted with it and there was no doubting that it prevented anything from rusting; just as well, because once applied nothing could remove it. Apparently, it was used trackside for anything metal but there was no mention of scooter bodywork. The primer came in a plain grey tin and had to be applied by brush. It was a thick gloopy substance, nothing like the fine spray that came from a can.
After about a week of drying time we had five cans of the finest Dupli-Colour Ford Transit white on standby to transform the Jet’s bodywork. The paint went on quite well and apart from the odd run here and there, we were quite satisfied with the finish and left it overnight to dry. The next day we rushed up the garden in anticipation only to be shocked at what we saw. I can only describe it as a reddish ‘glow’ emanating from everything we had sprayed. The British Rail red oxide paint was so powerful that it glowed through, the only answer was a quick trip to Halfords for some more cans to cover it up.
No matter what we did and however many cans were sprayed over, it just kept on coming back. It was almost like it was toxic, emitting some sort of radiation that couldn’t be extinguished no matter how hard we tried. For Eddie, it was a lesson learned. Industrial train paint should go nowhere near a scooter, even if it was free. It took two years for the finish to mellow but in the dark, it still showed through. When caught in a car’s headlight there it was, never to leave, a red-looking mist reminding us all that cheap paint could be very expensive.
I struck lucky when my dad lost interest in growing tomatoes and I inherited a first-class paint shop in the form of the now disused greenhouse.