Question: [ga] "I really love the look of the silver powdercoated frame but at, what $950 and that's with the weld spatter and such. No go. I wonder if anyone has had their own silver powdercoating done on their frame, how much it cost and how it turned out. Does the typical pro operation have the facilities to do an FFR frame ? If I call up a coater and say hey what do charge to do this and he asks "how big" what do I tell him ?"

Answers:

[JF] "The reason silver cost more is it has to be done twice. Some colors have to be cleared after the color is applied. I think most places just double the cost of a single color. I think a friend gave $800-$850 for gold and clear locally"

[WP] "The silver looks the best on the frame. Find someplace local to do it and have FFR send your frame bare. Take a couple of hours with the grinder remove splatter and smooth some welds in the visible areas. That would be from 6" behind the motor mounts to the X member."

[JR] "If I did it again I'd powder coat (Black)"

[Pi] "1) There are a number of high gloss silver (and silver metallic) powders available that should eliminate the need for a clearcoat on top, especially on a frame.
2) Powder clearcoats tend to have a yellow tint. If you are perfectionist enough to want to clear over silver on a frame, then you need to be aware of yellowing.
3) If you Must clearcoat, go with a 2 component liquid paint on top of the powder. Be sure that the powder coat does not get overcured with the additional heat cycle of the clearcoat. Most powders can absorb a 100% overbake (at least) without negative effect, so it is just something to keep in the back of your mind.
4) Be sure that your powder coater uses a convection oven and not an InfraRed system to cure your powder. IR works by line of site, and it is very difficult to get sufficient direct IR impingement on all surfaces of something as complex as the FFR frame. If you don't get a good cure everywhere...you will know it soon enough.
5) Give your prospective powder coater the overall dimensions and approx. weight of the frame.
6) Be sure he has facilities to clean (very well) and preferably also sandblast the frame immediately before coating. The blasting roughs up the surface and promotes better adhesion.
7) Try to find a coater who is already working with a silver you like. The time to prep, coat and cure the frame is nothing compared to the time and manpower to clean a system to shoot one piece of an off color, and then clean it again for the next job. If he can slip you piece into a regular production run, you'll save a lot of $.
8) An epoxy formula powder will provide better chip resistance, and corrosion protection that a polyester powder, but a hybrid powder (a mix of the two) gives 90% of the performance of a pure epoxy.
9) Knock those welds down, and be sure to clean them especially well. Powder tends to pull back from welds during the liquid phase (B Stage) of its cure. If it does happen, just touch up with a liquid paint."

[al] "Powder coating is great. BUT, if later you want to do a frame mod that requires welding your SOL on retaining that powder look. So try and do ALL your updates before. For this reason you might consider Por15."

[cd] "Just returned from downstairs looking at my bare frame. Order it bare and you will also receive a $50 credit."

[fk] "I had my frame powdwercoated silver locally for $600. It was painted black by FFR. Mitch started by blasting the frame with aluminum oxide as he feels this gives the surface the best texture for powder. He then coated it silver, let it cool, then coated it clear. Had it all done in less than 4 hours."

[RT] "I painted mine metallic silver, two part paint. It has held up well and can be touched up. Cost $100 for the paint"

[SC] "I just what everyone to know that Performance Coating in Jonesboro, GA did a awesome job coating my FFR 4 to 4 headers. They were very quick with getting me my headers back (1 week) and, also very cheap. It was only $149 shipped back to me. I will always deal with these people from now on. 1-770-478-2775 or www.headercoatings.com"

[oo] "We have a place that is closer.
New Image Powdercoat in Struthers Ohio
(Youngstown) ask for Jim 330-755-1918
I have had thousands of parts powder coated there and he does great work. Also does many headers with the jet hot type coating."

Comment: [pi] "I've spent two days stripping the very poor quality paint job from the frame. Absolutely terrible paint job: Big swaths of it come off with a fingernail.. Is this normal for FFR? Or did I just get the result of the FFR paint prep guy having a bad hair day? If it is normal, they should get out of the paint business and just spray the frame with a bit of oil to prevent rust. Easier to clean a bit of oil that to strip that damned frame!"

Suggestions: 

[Rt] "I put POR-15 on after I was to bare metal and have been very satisfied."

[jc] "I ordered my frame unpainted and used POR-15. It does not look as nice as the Powder Coating, but for the money I could not be happier...Looks good, cost about $75, 90% of it will never be seen!"

[ol] "I too ordered my frame unpainted. It allowed me to do a few mods here and there and then prep and paint it. Sprayed the frame first with House of Kolor Epoxy KP-2 primer and then sprayed it with HoK Silver White pearl then cleared it with HoK's UC-1 clear."

[wt] 'I sandblasted then brush painted with Rustoleum primer and flat black. Cheap, quick, durable and 24 touch up available at any Walmart for the inevitable scratches."

"If I'm not mistaken the paint on the frame is solely for the purpose of preventing rusting. Not expected is a quality paint job. Repaint and touchup is a part of this product."

[M3] "I ordered mine bare and went the POR-15 route. It's still time consuming and a PITA if you don't have some kind of frame rotisserie and or spray equipment. I spent at least 16 hours on my back and knees under and around the frame scrubbing it down multiple times and putting on the POR-15 and Chassis Coat top coats. I'm still not totally pleased with the results. I'd recommend the powder coat if your pocket will stand it."

[wl] "I ordered mine as a bare frame, and spent many hours trying to get all of the machine shop gunk off just to get it ready to prep and paint with the POR-15. I wished I had a giant dishwasher to put it in!"

www.por15.com

This stuff works great. Did my frame with it. Very tough finish."

My advice is to order the frame bare and then get it powdercoated locally AFTER you clean up the welds and splatter."

"hammertone finish is done with a product called Hammerite. Here is the URL for their site:
www.hammerite-automotive.com/

[Uraeus] I finished painting my frame with POR 15. It turned out better than I expected, but the weather cooperated. I started with the Marine Clean which is super for removing oil and grease. Spray it on, wait and wipe it off a couple of times. What appeared to be surface rust was really oil cooked on by welding. The Marine Clean took it right down to smooth shiny steel.

Then I sprayed on the Metal Ready. I especially concentrated on the corners and welds. Here again I let it stand and wiped it off with a wet cloth after it had dried. I did this twice to the entire frame. The smooth shiny steel was now a dull gray with white (zinc phosphate) where there had been surface rust.

I applied the first coat of POR 15 with foam brushes. For every coat it took five or six. Those cheap brushes don't hold up well to POR 15 solvent. For the second coat I used a foam roller and it worked very well. The brushes worked well in the nooks and crannies but the roller makes for a smoother finish.

The weather was dry when I painted so no bubbling in the corners, but every other day it rained. It was too humid to paint the POR 15 but the humidity helped it dry.

I painted the top coat using the Stirling Top Coat and the foam brushes to get in the corners and the foam roller to paint the rest. After two coats it was smooth and even. With the low-gloss of the top coat it looks a lot like powder coat and it is very tough. Tough enough to stop bolts from going into their intended holes without re-drilling them. In addition, if I do chip it I can touch it up. Try that with powder coat.

Before:

First coat of Por15:

Last coat of Por15

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