At FCD, we don't just work on supercars, sports cars and brand new cars. In fact it's not just cars we work on applying ceramic coatings and Paint Protection Film too. In the last few years alone we have worked on. a number of commercial vehicles, push bikes and even a couple of John Deere tractors!
On this occasion, a good customer of our friends over at Stable Vehicle Storage, asked us to give his pride and joy, Yamaha R1 60th Anniversary edition motorcycle a bit of TLC. This bike is a 2016 example and it's owner uses the bike very well racking up around 25,000 miles, in all seasons.
As always, we pre inspected the bike with the client, highlighting specific areas with more severe marks, and what would be required to remedy them and settled on a plan which worked with the client and his budget. In this case, he was not looking for total perfection removing every last mark, more so applying the correct protection making maintenance and washing easier as well as protecting the paintwork from bird poo, UV rays as well as chemical staining on the occasions the bike is out of storage.
We decided on a two stage enhancement polish to remove the majority of marks and imperfections, and the usual Crystal Serum Ultra & EXO we recommend to everyone, as well as particular focus on the satin gold wheels on this bike which had some heavy staining from brake dust and chemicals.
Starting with a deep clean on the bike, using snow foam and a detailing brush to get into all the nooks and crannies and draw out trapped dirt. This bike was actually relatively clean, as it had been pre cleaned and put away in storage, but the important bit in preparation for polishing and ceramic coating was the decontamination stage, tar and glue remover and iron fallout remover sprayed onto the bodywork and wheels of this Yamaha, the bike was very heavily contaminated but these products made light work, instantly giving the paintwork a smoother feel.
Now inside our detailing bay we can begin the polishing. One particularly bad area was a section of the exhaust system which had heavy surface rust, we have massively improved this using a heavy metal polish and an old machine polishing pad, giving the metalwork a much brighter appearance. The bike also had a few age related wear and tar scuffs and scratches that unfortunately would require paint, although we have massively improved them, to take your eye off the damage. Once the whole bike has been thoroughly polished, we can apply the ceramic coating, Gtechniq CS Ultra in our climate controlled premises, allowing the correct curing time before applying the hydrophobic top coat, EXO.
For the wheels we applied C5 Wheel Armour from Gtechniq to help reduce the build up of brake dust as well as when washing the bike, a simple jet wash and a spray of some all purpose cleaner with almost instantly remove a large percentage of dirt from the wheels.
Now complete, the bike is safely put back into storage at Stable, under it's soft bike cover and onto it's CTEK trickle charger and is ready to go for it's next outing, now very easier to look after and very well protected!