Front cowel repair

[Damon]

As I've finally managed to get the ZXR insured and ridable again, I decided to get round to fixing the fairings. I looked on ebay and was amazed at the prices for fairings. A quick look at my bank account saw me deciding to have a go at mending a fairly badly damaged fairing. After all, it couldnt get any worse...

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I found the small pieces of fairing that I picked up off the road after the RTA, and set to work piecing them together. I first tacked them together using epoxy and then backed the pieces with fibreglass tissue. I let each part dry and then fibreglassed them together until i got 1 x large piece that was big enough to fit into the gap in the head cowel.

Next i altered the shape of the large piece to that it would fit into the gap in the fairing and fibreglassed in. This left me with small gaps around the connecting edges that needed to be sorted for both strength and asthetics. I got the wet and dry sandpaper out and gave everything a quick sand down.

Once all the fibreglass had cured, I had a cup of tea and simultaneously got the car body filler out. I filled the gaps and any area I thought needed to be worked on. I left that for a number of hours to allow to cure properly before any sanding was done.

A few hours later and I decided to get the aluminium oxide paper (60 grit) out and start work on the now dry filler. This is an image of half way through the sanding stage.

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I continued to sand until I was happy with the shape. I made sure that there were no pits or edges that would stand out once it gets painted. I made my way up the grits until getting around the 160grit mark (remember this is aluminium oxide paper not regular sandpaper so for some reason 160 is actually very fine). I gave it a final eye up and started taping up the stickers, indicator and screen. A quick prime later and...

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I took the masking tape off and let to dry over night. This is how the cowel stands at the moment. There are a few inperfections I need to iron out and then I will get it sprayed. A new screen should be on its way shortly.

https://img231.imageshack.us/img231/9880/dsc01473ra0.th.jpghttps://img231.imageshack.us/images/thpix.gif

https://img227.imageshack.us/img227/8428/dsc01466li4.th.jpg

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And this is how the bike stands. I will get some pictures as soon as i fit the cowel. Thanks for reading

[Damon]

anyone got any comments?

[Whosthedaddy]

Very good.

Cool bike.

What happened in the first place?

...

[Gazdaman]

That is a very impressive repair mate!

Nice one, seriously!

Gaz

[Damon]

thanks,

well basically I let my good riding friend have a go of my bike, which, at the time I had only bought the night before. he went up the road and never came back. Got a phone call and ran 5 minutes up the road to find him and the bike lying on the floor, a good 10 metres from each other. He over shot a left hand corner, panicked, hit the brakes which stood the bike up causing him to run wide. into the opposite lane and up into a lampost.

The bike was a total write off. He spent weeks in hospital, going from intensive care to HDU to finally the normal wards. He broke his arm, dislocated his shoulder and punctured his lung with his broken ribs. Some scary stuff.

[SoND]

Ouch, glad he's ok.

Nice repair.
____________________
Go back to bed - You have no rights - "Streetfighters ~ Mainstream motorcycling's crackwhore sister."

[Wave2k]

thats a slick looking repair, good work

Glad to hear you're mate is ok, got any cash off him yet ?
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Ducati 1299 Panigale
2009 Corvette C6 z51
RS125->CBR400->RXS100->GSXR750K2->Ducati749S->CBR600RR5->TL1000R->DRz400->RSVR1000->Honda VTR SP1->CBR400->GSXR1000K6->Honda H100->CBR600RR3->Ducati1299

[Damon]