Comments on: Finishing Your Motorcycle Project – Anodizing Aluminum

By: jeffrey houser

jeffrey houser — Fri, 01 May 2009 14:24:04 +0000

I’m looking next year to get my rims and pegs in a Kawasaki green. I’m trying to get prices on this. Could you please e-mail me with this. I could also send you some test pegs so I colud see how they come out. Thanks for your time.

By: ALAN ALLREAD

ALAN ALLREAD — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 00:26:50 +0000

The best aluminum alloy to use is 6061-t6 or t651.Don’t forget to seal with hot water or nickel acetate.
The real problems are “uncle sam”,the chemicals needed and the waste materials produced.Dispose of correctly.
The anodic coating will increase a physical dimension by .0001 or more,so watch it.
The colors almost unlimited and a sight to see.

By: todd

todd — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 19:58:47 +0000

A clear anodizing looks great on cast parts with a relatively high zinc content (side covers, etc). It leaves a dark, flat gray color that is very industrial looking. The more zinc, the closer to flat black it gets. To me, it looks much nicer than cheezy polishing and easier to achieve than a consistent brush finish with spray-clear coat.

-todd

By: Bryce

Bryce — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 16:57:00 +0000

For those with titanium, it too can be anodized. The cool part of titanium is that dye isn’t even required. The thickness of the oxide layer (determined by the amount of current) basically acts as a color filter and only reflects one color.

A professor I had for a jewelry class in college did a lot of cast aluminum that she started anodizing. She would make silicone molds of sea shells then fill them with wax and cast those in aluminum and anodize them. Bright blue metallic sea shells are a sight to behold.

Walt makes a great point though. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. That said, I’d be darn impressed if someone took things like transmission cases, frames, and the like and anodized them.

By: Sid

Sid — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 16:21:36 +0000

Walt – good points…not only quantity of color, but placement (as you also mentioned) of the color is key.

it is refreshing to see other colors as I have only seen a limited range. Now, about that tie-dyed triple clamp (kidding)….