Project Magna, an '82 VF750C, is progressing as I work my way through the front end. With the forks on the bench, disassembly went smoothly and all the components are straight and serviceable with the exception of the oil seals, of course. The photo on the left shows what leaking fork seals produce — imagine that gunk on your brake components. After a thorough cleaning I set to refinishing the aluminum lower fork legs. Like many of the bike's polished aluminum pieces these were clear-coated at the factory, but decades of stone chips and neglect have them looking like a bad case of acne.
This won't do, so my solution is to first strip the clear-coat with chemical stripper followed by a wet-sanding with 320-grit, then 800-grit. The 320 will remove the pockmarks of corrosion and the 800 eliminates sanding marks.
For some parts I'll go with even finer sanding, up to 3000, but I liked the dull sheen that the 800-grit provided on these legs — very factory-like. Here's the sanded part ready for polish.
It's easy to get carried away with aluminum polishing but for the fork legs I wanted just a bit of shine, so a single pass with Mother's Mag & Aluminum Polish did the trick.
To try and preserve the finish we could have these parts clear coated with powder coat, but I've chosen to leave them bare and encourage the owner to give them a buffing once a year. They live in a harsh environment where stone chipping is a fact of life, and they're very easy to access for a quick cleaning/polishing.
To try and preserve the finish we could have these parts clear coated with powder coat, but I've chosen to leave them bare and encourage the owner to give them a buffing once a year. They live in a harsh environment where stone chipping is a fact of life, and they're very easy to access for a quick cleaning/polishing.
Ready for reassembly!
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