Modern Vespa

Greetings all! Last week I had a lovely scooter vacation with some friends in northwestern PA. Unfortunately I took a minor spill with my GTV and tipped over while turning into a parking lot of freshly-laid and unexpectedly very deep gravel.

By some miracle, the damage is pretty minor-- I managed to avoid denting the cowl at all; it only received some very slight dings to the paint which are hardly noticeable, I think I can give it a good buffing and hit the dings with a touch-up pen. The lower front corner of the leg shield took the brunt of the hit and I think was the first point of contact in our dive into the gravel; there is a good bit of scraping of the paint, and the leg shield trim is pretty scraped/dented as well. There is a TEENY dent of about 1' on the underside of the floorboard, it's not visible and you can only feel it if you run your hand along the underside of the scoot. The paint damage area is about 6"x6" or so.

I hate the thought of turning it into my insurance for repair for the fairly minor paint work, so I think I'm going to DIY. The leg shield trim is an easy replacement, $40 from Scooterwest. From scooterpaint.com, I can get a kit which includes the primer, paint, clearcoat (all aerosols), and sandpaper/etc for about $80. Since the wee dent on the underside isn't visible, I'm leaving that alone.

I've painted a couple old horse trailers with a Wagner paint sprayer system, but that seems like overkill for a job this small. Also, I wasn't nearly as concerned with the finish quality of the 30+ year old horse trailers as I am with my nearly-mint-condition GTV, lol...

Can anyone give me your tips. tricks, or advice for this project? It will be my first time tackling a job like this, and I don't want to f*** it up any more than it already is, haha... I'm assuming the aerosol kit would be best for a job this size? If not, I could go with liquid paints, but I'm not sure about application tools.

I don't have photos of the damage yet; I don't think I was emotionally prepared to take pics right after it happened. I may try to get some later tonight though.

I can't help but there are a lot of Youtube videos about fixing paint damage on cars.

I would love it if you posted pictures of before, during, and after. My husband's scooter has almost identical damage, from the previous owner, and we've been thinking it would be a good DIY project for us.

Painting can be easy if the prep work is good.
First step is to put masking tape about 1/2 inch out from the area to be worked on put a perimeter of masking tape so you know the space you are going to be working on.
Second step is to cover the other areas that you may get spray on with plastic/paper and cover it. So when you are working the only area open for paints will the area you are working on.
Now the prep work will require you to scuff the area, given that it hasnt been dented, but scratched, I would suggest using 220 grit wet dry sand paper, spray some soapy water on the concerned area, sand it. This will cause enough of bonding surface for the primer and paint. Once you have done that, wipe it clean with acetone. Apply your primer and when that is done use 600/800/1200 wet dry sand paper and soapy water to smooth the primer out. Yeah it may be overkill but it is your Vespa and you want to make it smooth.
Next wipe down with acetone again.
Last step is apply your paint, wet sand & then clear coat seal.
Yes lot of elbow grease but you should endup with a patch that merges with the rest of the body. I am guessing that aerosol cans of paint are already diluted to leave a fine layer. You will want to build up about 3-4 layers.
You don't need to go to bare metal to get back to normal.
If you don't use aerosol cans then you will have to dilute the primer and paint to fill up your sprayer and there are mixing ratios using the reducer and hardener that one gets when they are going to prime and paint.
As GuzziGal points out there are possibly plenty of repainting restoration videos on youtube for sure.
Doing it yourself will give you great satisfaction. If you f'it up you can always fix it, thats the beauty of doing things that aren't life threatening.
I say go for it whatever the skill level.

Augh, SUCH a bummer about the scoot, but at least you weren't physically hurt, too. The emotional bit might take time. Pat your bike lovingly on the headset, and tell it it'll be alright.

I don't have experience with anything major. But I can say that for very small areas where you mostly just want to keep the metal protected, a good nail polish does the job pretty well. Nail polish is pretty cheap, you can get it tons of places, and comes in conveniently small bottles you can toss in the glovebox. I had a bottle that matched my Siena Ivory quite nicely that became part of my onboard toolkit. Not super useful advice for your particular situation, but it might be helpful in the future, or for someone else.

Be aware that -- if your finish is a metallic with a clear coat -- it will be nearly impossible to get a good match without respraying both the color and clear coat all the way to the edges of the panel in question. Failing to do so will often result in a repair that looks worse than the original damage.

If your damage is a few minor scratches, you'll likely be better off touching them up with a very fine brush rather than spraying.

This is kinda my fear, but since the area in question is at the bottom corner of the front of the leg shield, it isn't a terribly noticeable spot to begin with. If a person wasn't specifically looking for it, they might not even notice it at all; you almost need to bend over to get a good look. I'm hoping to contain the re-spray area as much to that kinda-out-of-the-way location as possible.

I will try to get pics tonight and see what y'all think.

Here are some photos.

Is the prep any different for the matte paints? My hubby's is the matte 742/B Grigio or Titanium Gray.

Mine isn't matte; it's grigio sfera, 784/B. Hopefully non-matte is easier?

Oh boy... Paint. Not a simple topic. Way too much to cover in a post. I learned by doing with the eyes of a expert watching over my shoulder. I went to a local paint & body shop and got to know the owner. This was a small one man shop and the guy running it was in his 70s. I wanted to learn and offered to pay him as if he was doing the entire job if he would watch over my shoulder and keep me from going off in the weeds. There were so many steps before I ever started painting. The prep work is what takes all the time. Maybe you can find a local expert willing to impart some wisdom for a fee. I definitely got my money's worth.

-Craig

I know yours isn't. Yes, I was thinking matte might be less persnickety.