SL Owners BEWARE of sensitive paint

gnance said:

no excuse for this on a $65K bike

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No excuses whatever the price.....

Sloopy said:

You did not mention clay? That would be my first step; then light to medium machine polish. Some waxes or so called polish do little to remove surface flaws, dirt and or stains.

Sand and clear coat would most likely be best permanent fix.

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You cant do that . The paint is white underneath with a tint over the top you will go through the colour .
I suspect it is similar to the Desmosedici paint my stains looked the same . They did fade away .

clean it off with a soft towel and distilled water and put it in the sun, you might be surprised the tannic acid in the leaves discolored the paint, I guess Ducati went to great extremes to keep the weight down. Paint is very heavy, but they may have got carried away.

If you're local and want to stop by I'd be glad to take a look at it and try to help out,


sean

Sounds like the 1199 protective film kit is needed.

You mentioned rain and sap and stuff. that looks simply like moisture caught below the clearcoat and will dry away in the sun after some time, IMHO. Now if you had bird crap sit on it for a long time or sap, then what actually happens is that the paint layers start separating and reforming non-smooth , I read somewhere, due to temperature differential and moisture damaging the layers internally. Sap can etch into paint as well, bonding itself to the paint as if it were part of the paint. I read that the acid theory of bird crap and such is unfounded (not true). You have damage underneath the layers of paint and if its simply moisture, will dry out in time. Can't blame the paint, it is all enviro safe these days and that comes at a cost. If you have bad application however, then yes, they should offer a complete respray. Both my bikes have thin areas. Fortunately on my MV it is in a depression that is hard to reach and see, the rest is nice and thick/ deep color and brilliant. The 1199 have some thin areas that are not as shiny, what a shame! The consolation is that these are hand painted, at least the MV is, and the slight variance is kinda cool and ok because of its hand applied nature. For the Superleggera, for the price, even if hand done, needs to be master painter style or should be considered defective. No warranty for contaminant caused damage, current water based paints is simply not durable to this. Scratch easily too! Someday they should use that PPG ceramiclear stuff like on highline Benz. Why they haven't yet on high line bikes is questionable, IMO but so are many other things.

*reference Autoglym study on effects of bird crap on paint.

Fragile said:

You mentioned rain and sap and stuff. that looks simply like moisture caught below the clearcoat and will dry away in the sun after some time, IMHO. Now if you had bird crap sit on it for a long time or sap, then what actually happens is that the paint layers start separating and reforming non-smooth , I read somewhere, due to temperature differential and moisture damaging the layers internally. Sap can etch into paint as well, bonding itself to the paint as if it were part of the paint. I read that the acid theory of bird crap and such is unfounded (not true). You have damage underneath the layers of paint and if its simply moisture, will dry out in time. Can't blame the paint, it is all enviro safe these days and that comes at a cost. If you have bad application however, then yes, they should offer a complete respray. Both my bikes have thin areas. Fortunately on my MV it is in a depression that is hard to reach and see, the rest is nice and thick/ deep color and brilliant. The 1199 have some thin areas that are not as shiny, what a shame! The consolation is that these are hand painted, at least the MV is, and the slight variance is kinda cool and ok because of its hand applied nature. For the Superleggera, for the price, even if hand done, needs to be master painter style or should be considered defective. No warranty for contaminant caused damage, current water based paints is simply not durable to this. Scratch easily too! Someday they should use that PPG ceramiclear stuff like on highline Benz. Why they haven't yet on high line bikes is questionable, IMO but so are many other things.

*reference Autoglym study on effects of bird crap on paint.

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Hello Everyone,
I'm new here but a longtime Ducati rider and am currently getting ready to purchase an R.

I've been reading this thread about the SL and I need to chime in. I'm not trying to stir anything up with anyone, but I know quite a bit about motorcycle paint since it's all I've been involved in my entire working life.

One is, the SL is not the Desmo color. Either of the Desmo colors actually. Our company offers both Desmo colors, we attempted to match the SL color and have so far not been successful. The SL color has a certain amount of florescence to it that no other vehicle currently on the road has. It's going to take more work.

Another issue is this waterborne paint thing you mentioned above. It's simply not true. Waterborne paints have urethane clear coats yet. The durability of a modern paint job is not determined solely by the basecoat formulation. Countless new vehicles are painted in waterborne and they have no durability issues whatsoever.

We're also talking about 2 different issues here. The SL is especially reactive to sunlight. This is a UV resistance issue, not a chemical resistance durability issue. Bird droppings are nothing to do with the fade that SL's experience. When sap or bird droppings, both incredibly harmful to paint, are not dealt with correctly and properly they will "stain" paint. But this holds true with urethane or waterborne base coats.

Regarding the SL paint, it's going to be difficult to repair these bikes with an accurate color match. There are no florescent paint jobs that stand up well to UV. The SL isn't a strictly florescent color, but it does have similarities and some properties of one. When the SL first launched I went to a local dealer where they had 3 lined up. All 3 had slightly different colors right out of the crates. The color does seem to slow down it's fading once exposed to sunlight for a little while. But if I was an SL owner, I would not let the bike sit all day in the sun for many days in a row.

Again, I'm not trying to stir things up here, it's a great forum. But misconceptions aren't helpful for anyone.

Phl said:

found this here

you know your bike is actually mine, as my racing #is 218 dibs if you're ever gonna get rid of it but you gotta sort that spot thing out first ...

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Just asking, will you notice this from afar or just when you really try to look for it like looking for waldo at the back of a cereal box?

gnance said:

no excuse for this on a $65K bike

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Agreed, I am tired of the "Its an Italian exotic made in a small factory " BS.

Echo's of Ferrari F40 paint so thin the carbon mat texture can be seen through the paint, looks great from a distance. If it where me I wouldn't worry, the bike is incredible i would call it " Patina " but that's just me

I just had Opti-Coat Pro applied to my car and 899. While researching the process, I read that it has a good deal of UV protection. If it is the UV that is causing the discoloration, then I would suggest looking into having this done.

I am particularly pleased with the results and like the idea of the decal work being under the layer of coating.

I had these same dark spots as well on my SL. After enough exposure to direct sunlight all of them completely vanished again. weirdo!

Hmm, I wonder which vehicles you are referring to that use waterborne paint and have no durability issues whatsoever. Perhaps you are talking about color consistency, but I am referring to resistance to contaminants. I have not had a single modern vehicle impervious to sap and bird crap and such. The only paint I have encountered which is so durable to resist alteration by contaminants is the CARC polyurethane / epoxy primer used on defense vehicles and also Imron polyeurethane enamel.

BTW I have your touch-up paint for my MV and its really good match, Thanks.

ToucuUpDirect said:

Hello Everyone,
Another issue is this waterborne paint thing you mentioned above. It's simply not true. Waterborne paints have urethane clear coats yet. The durability of a modern paint job is not determined solely by the basecoat formulation. Countless new vehicles are painted in waterborne and they have no durability issues whatsoever.

.

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Fragile said:

Hmm, I wonder which vehicles you are referring to that use waterborne paint and have no durability issues whatsoever. Perhaps you are talking about color consistency, but I am referring to resistance to contaminants. I have not had a single modern vehicle impervious to sap and bird crap and such. The only paint I have encountered which is so durable to resist alteration by contaminants is the CARC polyurethane / epoxy primer used on defense vehicles and also Imron polyeurethane enamel.

BTW I have your touch-up paint for my MV and its really good match, Thanks.

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Let me start off by saying, thanks for the business!

New vehicles, waterborne or urethane painted, are certainly susceptible to sap and droppings. I didn't mean to make is sound otherwise, I was more trying to explain that there is not an extra danger due to waterborne. At the end of the day it's the clearcoat that determines the durability of the paint job.

The products you are speaking of that are a complete different animal. They are made for durability with gloss and price coming second. It's not too difficult to make a clearcoat stand up to mother nature, but they either do not have the clarity and depth or they are extremely expensive. We have a clearcoat available that is incredibly hard and resistant. It's not the normal clearcoat we sell because it's $600 per gallon and it's just not necessary. But put that clearcoat over waterborne or urethane paint and you will be amazed at the durability. It's incredible against rock chips, droppings, sap...pretty much anything.

Just to follow up on this thread: As Wilks and Gecko have noted, these spots do in fact fade in the sun. It's actually kind of amazing... the photo/UV reactive paint just seems to heal itself as I was told it would.

It turns out that the tail fairing paint however was defective, and those spots did not heal despite prolonged exposure to the sun (at many angles, etc), and so it was replaced under warranty. I'm still somewhat stunned that the rest of it just "went away" on its own, but my eyes do not lie.

As an engineer all I can think of is the adage "problems that go away by themselves come back by themselves" but I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing in this case. I'm imagining that if I ever get bored with the paint scheme I could put a masked design on it and leave it in the sun for a few hours, then remove the mask and it will be like a temporary tattoo

It's caught measles it will be ok when it's seen the tec!

It will be put right Ducati are not going to want bad publicity for their SL's

Jello said:

Just to follow up on this thread: As Wilks and Gecko have noted, these spots do in fact fade in the sun. It's actually kind of amazing... the photo/UV reactive paint just seems to heal itself as I was told it would.

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Jello, Wilks, and Gecko, how long did it take for your spots to go away? I took delivery of my SL on Saturday, and by Sunday evening it had a few spots (mine appear to have been caused from dead bugs).

three days under italian sun and they where all gone. my spots where all under liquefied insects

Gecko said:

three days under italian sun and they where all gone. my spots where all under liquefied insects

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Thanks Gecko...I'm hoping that equates to one day under Las Vegas sun

I think what is happening is that the paint has some kind of phosphorescence in it. When you get a big bug or something that shades a piece, it goes dark. Make sure you clean it immediately following a ride to minimize.