1979 Laverda 1200 Mirage green???

The sidepanel photo I posted earlier was to show flake size rather than shade of green. It was an original green from Breganze.
I have a green Mirage here which was sprayed by Dream Machine and the shade (and flake) are not right.
A bit dark, not yellow enough, too 'metallic' and not enought 'flake'.
The way the light catches it is not right either, mainly as a result of this.
 
if I can get a good enough match from my paint supplier I am going to spray it myself. I do have a range of tips for my new paint gun. Flake size is just one of the issues, it is a truly peculiar combination with the yellowish highlight in the green, plus the new paints are just different than the older products used back in the day. As there are no other green Mirages anywhere near me (closest is about 2,500+ miles away) it is not likely to be standing beside another green MIrage anytime soon for direct comparison, but it would be nice to get it as correct as possible.

the first thing my paint supplier said when he saw me walk through his door with Tim's sample sidecover was, and I quote, "I'm not going to be able to match that exactly...."

Paul LeClair
 
Here's my latest acquisition.
Dream machine paint.
Second one was painted in Spain by my painter a few years ago.
Neither is on the money but the Spanish painted one is closer.
Neither have the flake right, and the Spanish one has too much Flop in the colour.
 

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Hi Grant

in the first photo, something looks a little off about the front fender...... but I like the looks of both bikes, both photos.

I stripped the extra Laverda 1200 tank earlier today, was struck that the sickly green of the aircraft coating remover I am using is almost the colour of Mirage green... :o The extra pair of sidecovers and the extra tail piece I have are bright orange, but the paint is in reasonably good shape, I think I am only going to sand them for a good base for the high build primer, save me having to deal with bare plastic/glass fiber/whatever they are, hoping that the paint I am leaving on won't react with my primer, we'll see, worst case is I will have to strip bare if the primer reacts, best case is I won't have to at all.... :D

I also just finished the final primer and sand on my complete set of 1978 Kawasaki 650 bodywork, I learned a lot about working with and spraying "modern" materials on the Kawasaki as a test project, I had to strip the rear fender back to bare metal THREE times before I finally got it primed and surfaced correctly, surface prep is everything to the final quality of a paint job, I am going to spray silver base/ candy red colour coat/clear, all water base, sometime in the next couple of days on the Kawasaki bits, will be interesting to see how it turns out before tackling colour and clear on the Laverda.

Paul LeClair
 
That is a Ducrapi mudguard but I have a correct one to fit once I start to return it to standard.
There are a few bits and bobs needing doing to it but I will not spend another fortune on this one (he said).

Look forward to seeing your paint results with the 650.
 
Hi Tim

to get enough pressure and volume at the paint gun I had to remove the restrictive air hose quick connects and plumb a new half inch rubber air hose direct to the compressor and gun, with a new high flow air/oil seperator, and a new high flow regulator. Now I have the needed 23 psi continuous at the gun inlet all day long for the water based paint products, no problem.

I think a lot of people experiencing compressor issues are just experiencing high restriction in old style air/oil seperators, overly restrictive old style quick connects, and too small diameter air hose. I more than tripled my 5 hp/30 gallon compressor's effective ouput at the gun inlet with these upgrades....

I am just now off to another paint supplier apparently equipped with a computer scanner for analyzing paint samples, will see what they come up with from scanning your sample Mirage lizard green side cover.

Paul LeClair
 
back from the PPG Platinum level seller. Slick operation, fancy computers, paint scanners, etc, all of which Tim's side panel completely defeated...... :(

as Tim previously mentioned, there is a yelowish/goldish tint in the clearcoat. This apparently confuses the scanner, and it can't take a read of the base green coat, or of the yellow/gold clearcoat, it tries unsuccesfully to read it all together and has a nervous breakdown.

in a current thread on the General Laverda board  http://laverdaforum.com/forum/index.php/topic,81973.0.html  it is stated that a few really early Mirage's were not green, then later green Mirages came from the factory in green. I always thought Slater's themselves had the Mirage's painted in green, I had no idea they came from the factory like that. If the Mirage green is a factory colour, I wonder if there is a factory paint code or codes available? Does anyone know?

the present suggestion from the PPG people is to try and get close on a less yellowish green base then mix coarse gold flake into the first couple of coats of clear, and/or maybe also some yellow tint, then finally spray a few clear clear coats. I left the side panel with them and they are playing around, I left some cash to pay for some sample spray outs of various combinations, will be interesting to see what they come up with.

Paul LeClair
 
Paul,I think you are on a fool's errand trying to establish if Mirage green was a factory colour. Hell, we don't even know the code for the gold Jota and that WAS factory applied.

My Mirage here was painted with a silver base coat and the colour was a transparent green over it. The golden yellow came from the top coat. No metallic gold was used.
I gave my painter an original Mirage sidepanel, as per an earlier photo and he had it scanned and matched with no problem. Can you try another outfit to see if they can do it?

I feel your pain but maybe you will end up having a pot of lacquer sent from the UK as someone suggested? Try to source the big flake silver locally though.
 
Big flack silver,wasnt one of the really early fibreglass bevels painted with a huge metalflake siliver finish,sounds beach buggy 60s chopper style
 
well, a fool's errand for a fool..... :D

so, big flake silver basecoat, transparent green colour coat, golden yellow top coat, easy peasy, what could go wrong :o

the outfit I went to this morning is the only place I could find so far in Calgary with a colour scanner that would deal direct with the public. I found out the hard way that most of the automotive paint suppliers here deal only with commercial operations like the big bodyshops, they literally won't even let a member of the public through their door, so my supplier options appear to be very limited. I went to another PPG direct supplier yesterday who does deal with the public, but they refuse to do any colour matching, they will only mix to an existing known paint code that the buyer supplies, so useless for my purposes.

I'll call the supplier back and ask them to test spray some samples with your suggested combination with as big a flake as they have available and a transparent green in a few shades, with a golden yellow tint added to the clear. A coarse flake silver base coat, and a tinted clear, are going to drive the price of paint supplies through the roof...... :o

Paul LeClair
 
Paul, only silver base and green clear on top, no yellow topcoat, all in one application.

Hell, I have been on fools errands many times.
Currently I am chasing my tail trying to get the bikes registered here. I have now found out they have to be registered as historical vehicles so I have had to find a specialist who cando this. Apparently 4 months each and 1000 euros plus all taxes... Ffffffff. I want to register 4 bikes. Bugger.

Good luck with the colourmatching.
 
Vince said:
Big flack silver,wasnt one of the really early fibreglass bevels painted with a huge metalflake siliver finish,sounds beach buggy 60s chopper style
Click to expand...

The silver 250 and 450 fibreglass tank "Silver Shotgun" singles were like that. I had a silver 250 for a while that looked and sounded the dog's bollocks, clipons, rearsets, single seat, Lafranconi, just was kind of slow compared to the Jappo 2 stroke twins at the time. And I had a mate with a 350 single with a factory purple that looked like the paint was about a foot thick, so many clear/flake coats. And yeah, the front and rear disc brake bevel twins had the same silver as the singles for a while, around '76?

Ken
 
Grant said:
Paul, only silver base and green clear on top, no yellow topcoat, all in one application.

Hell, I have been on fools errands many times.
Currently I am chasing my tail trying to get the bikes registered here. I have now found out they have to be registered as historical vehicles so I have had to find a specialist who cando this. Apparently 4 months each and 1000 euros plus all taxes... Ffffffff. I want to register 4 bikes. Bugger.

Good luck with the colourmatching.
Click to expand...

so where does the golden yellow hue come from, a properly applied clear is......well......clear?

Paul LeClair
 
Paul LeClair said:
Grant said:
Paul, only silver base and green clear on top, no yellow topcoat, all in one application.

Hell, I have been on fools errands many times.
Currently I am chasing my tail trying to get the bikes registered here. I have now found out they have to be registered as historical vehicles so I have had to find a specialist who cando this. Apparently 4 months each and 1000 euros plus all taxes... Ffffffff. I want to register 4 bikes. Bugger.

Good luck with the colourmatching.
Click to expand...

so where does the golden yellow hue come from, a properly applied clear is......well......clear?

Paul LeClair
Click to expand...


Probably yellowing due to sun exposure over time - Oh hang on, that would never happen in the UK would it :D

 
Hi Paul.

    It just occurred to me there is a heavy SILVER underlay using a SLIGHT START COAT..... A bit of a fleck followed by a heafity lay over.

    I can give you full details of the dude who did my colours.. Joe HENDERSON is a  F..kING WIZARD .. I just don't know how to get this stuff to YOU ! FAR to Flamable !!


                  Please PM ME I have spoken to Joe He is happy to help......

                                Timmy
 
Modern paints can be very trick.
I am no expert in this area but I could see how they could combine effects and finishes in a top coat.

Tim, I always wonder why I can't ship flammable materials by post yet if I order such off a website it can be sent by post by them...
There is probably a way to do it.
 
Hello again.

  I can get this paint mixed... The problem is shifting it to Canada !! Getting it through the Canadian customs is going to be a total bummer !!

    Maybe P L C can advise me,
 
very kind again, Tim

I have no idea about shipping flammable materials. I think I need to wait to see what the PPG supplier comes up with, they seem to be putting some heart into trying to get a match, and I have left them payment for them to spray up various combinations of green metallic as test samples, including a BMW Nurburg green metallic that at least in the small sample swatch looks kind of close.

failing a match for the lizard green, I could go an entirely different direction with 2003 Kawasaki Z1000 Pearl Blazing Orange, truly the most striking orange to my eyes that I have ever seen, or a similar orange from House of Kolor done from their Sunset Pearl PBC 31 line.

or, another alternative again, I dragged a crashed and broken 1982 Jota fairing shell down off my back shelf the other day (for the locals, it came off of Andy Higg's former Jota from his last crash with that bike) and have been mulling over possibly fitting it to my 79 1200 Mirage after repairing it and painting it, all I would have to do to mount it would be to make and weld two threaded bosses onto the 1200's frame neck.....

it is the bloody end of April and we have had the worst winter and early spring here in Calgary, as I type it is snowing again like a mad thing, aaaaarggghhhh...... I am going mad, if I can't ride I need to do something with the various bikes....... :o

Paul LeClair
 
If it makes you feel any better I have four of the fackers and can't ride any of them as they are not registered, and it's 25?C here...
 
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