Gallery of Lights
Lanterns/Fixtures => Traffic Lights => Topic started by: basilicon89 on October 26, 2011, 06:10:20 PM
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Forrest Green Incandescent PEEK signal. That's it for me. Man, sanding off the enamel is a pain!!! I might just sand the rough spits and just paint over the rest.....
The original powdercoat is baked on in an oven. Its nearly impossible to clean it completely off. You can do what you said...clean up the rough spots and paint over OR get some chemical paint strippers.
Or...if money isn't tight sandblast it.
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I'm 13 so I don't have the money for a sandblaster lol. I actually found chipping off the paint with a flathead screwdriver did much better and got right down to the bare aluminum. The inside I can just paint right over as it's very smooth and even. The outside is what i need to smooth out before i apply the new black paint. @ Nick; what exact paint did you use on your california green ped signal?
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I'm 13 so I don't have the money for a sandblaster lol. I actually found chipping off the paint with a flathead screwdriver did much better and got right down to the bare aluminum. The inside I can just paint right over as it's very smooth and even. The outside is what i need to smooth out before i apply the new black paint. @ Nick; what exact paint did you use on your california green ped signal?
Well then cross that off the list.
Paint color was Rustoleum Gloss Black high performance enamel
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OK Thanks. :)
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I still haven't decided whetever I'm completly repainting my two GE signals or just touchup the under side of the visors.
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I'm just going to repaint mine becase the origional paint is rough on parts ofthe outside and it's chipping away. I removed a good portion of the paint by scratching it off with a screwdriver. :o
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The paint on mine could use some touching up but I kinda like the off the street look they have, but the visors are a bit too faded for my liking so I'll probably repaint them next spring.
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The paint on mine isn't faded, but it will eventually just fall off if I don't do somethinng about it. The powder coat didn't cure to the aluminum very well.
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Well some of the visor paint on mine has fallen off so it's a little bit of both.
Edit: split topic from the list your signals thread.
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The paint on mine isn't faded, but it will eventually just fall off if I don't do somethinng about it. The powder coat didn't cure to the aluminum very well.
It shouldn't fall off without some weathering. In a home environment the finish should stay on. Whatever paint loss it recieved came from its years hanging. Exceptions would be rough handling or forcible paint removal (sanding/chemical stripping)
As far as powdercoat not properly baking into the aluminum, thats common for almost all modern signal heads. While being made, signals are bathed in electrically charged chemicals so that the charged powder sticks to the charged aluminum. Then the parts are baked in an oven and the powder melts on the head sticking to the charged housing
Nowadays thats for a shorter time to speed up production and the paint isn't attracted to the metal. The signals are no longer designed to last 50 or more years. 15-20 years usually for an aluminum signal life
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As well the alloy probably was not as well prepared, as to get a long life coat you need to do a chemical etch with sodium hydroxide and then a wash and an acid pickle. This takes time, so probably all that is done is a degreaser wash then into the powder spray. The powder then does not provide as strong a bond, and will eventually develop pinholes at the thin spots and start to corrode under the coating.
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The signal itself is very well made and I like it very much. The paint is like an eggshell though. If you accidentally bang the signal tha paint cracks off and flakes off in places. The back and insides the paint is fine. Just a few big scratches on the back.
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It probably bubbled when it was still in service so even though it's inside the paint will still flake off if you scrape it. The paint on my GE signals look like they're real paint instead of powder coating though.
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It could have bubbled. Freezing winters and scorchign summers will probably do that to painted metal because of the expansion and contraction........
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Which is why it flaked off when you touch it. :P
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Only on parts of the signal. The inside paitn is very well stuck to the aluminum and the top and bottom of each section as well.
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Sounds like weathering to me.
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That's what I thoguht too, but the paint usually fades too.... Foster is in the woods of RI thoguh.......
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I've noticed that the paint on newer stuff tends to chip instead of fade.
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Yeah. It's more about the green stuff rather the happy customer.
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Almost everything is like that now...
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everybody needs to go back to the old days where we all made the things we needed.
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Sadly that's not going happen anytime soon and personally even if we made them it won't be much better if they still cut corners.