New paint, new logos, same beautiful bike underneath.
Much as I loved the cream and blue, as did a lot of you, I wasnt overly happy with the finish of the Spray.Bike paint. It chipped too easily for my liking, particularly for a commuter/daily bike. It also held onto stains, particualy brake dust from the front cantis. The only benefit I've found to the chainstay U-brake is it doesnt drip black goop down the seatstays...
With this in mind I stripped the bike down and took it to a local powder coaters for a shotblast and a powder coat. I went for gloss clear in the end, which confused the powder coaters no end. Combined with the shotblasted surface of the metal it creates a lovely flat grey colour with a subtle glitter in direct sunlight. It should rust, but slowly and delicately, which I am totally fine with.
The logos are just stickers. I considered clearcoating them, but then if I did pick up any chips to them I'd have a much bigger job replacing them. As it is I can let them get tatty and replace them all in 10 minutes with some fresh ones if I so wish.
I've also become much more of a fan of black tyres again lately. They show brake grot much less, and I particualy with a monochrome paintjob they certainly help the rest of the bike pop.
The build is more or less unchanged, as it's just the way I like it. One think I wasnt particularly happy aboput was the care taken by the powder coaters - They shot blasted the threads and crown race, and didnt effectively mask the canti posts. Nothing fatal, and nothing a bit of cleanup won't fix, but I do reccomend that if you are getting a bike powdered then take it somewhere with a lot of bike experience, or one that at least comes reccomended. On the other hand it did only cost me 60 quid, so I mustn't complain too much.
Here's some lovely pics for you x