I am actually doing the same process for the same bike 99 900ss (Black!!!). Also painting my 996 track body work (haven't decided what color). Also doing a GSXR for a friend in Plum loco (Don't really like mentioning other bikes but oh well its for learning purposes). Damn didn't even realize how many painting projects I had. Don't rattle can it, even if your really good it turns out looking mediocre IMHO.
To start out, if you've never done any painting before there is a learning curve!!! If your not willing to mess up a couple times and starting over I suggest letting someone else do it.
If your up to the challenge and willing to learn from your mistakes its actually a very good learning process that in the end is extremely rewarding.
Every painting project is different, but this is how I go about most of them.
1)Wet sand the clear coat off with a sand paper in the range of 400 grit.
2)When all the clear coat is off and your down to just the base color, spray high build auto primer (This can be rattle can primer) closest color to the color you want to paint your bike, on all your panels.
3)When the panels are dry you should be able to easily see flaws such as chips, scratches etc. If they are deep (can't cover them with a couple more coats of the high build primer) you will need some light weight body filler (I use a product called ICING but any light weight body filler should do)
After filling the flaws wet sand down using sanding block (600grit range), making sure everything is smooth and contoured.
4) Another coat of primer, inspect everything again repeat step 3 if necessary.
5) After your satisfied with your prep job and on the final primer coat I usually lightly wet sand primer with 600grit to get it nice and smooth. (I don't think this is necessarily needed if your decent with the primer, but I do it anyway)
PREP WORK DONE
For painting I would greatly suggest a HVLP paint gun with a tip either 1.3mm or 1.4mm. You don't need anything real expensive, unless you can see yourself doing this a lot. I have done excellent work with a $60 Harbor Freight special(a kit with a main gun and also a touchup gun).
There are a couple of different kinds of paint.
Lacquer
Acrylic Enamel (Usually the standard in OEM Cars) Single stage or Two stage )
There might even be more, but these are the ones that I am familiar with
If you want a really good long lasting paint I would go with Acrylic Enamel
Single stage is you mix it with reducer and harder and shoot it, when it dries your done, all you have to do is buff it out.
Two stage is a base coat you spray on and depending on the quality you can sand and fix (to a certain point), then you have to clear coat it with a Urethane clear coat.
If you are interested in going the Lacquer way let me know and I will give you the details on that also.
I'm sure you will have about a million questions, the internet is a decent resource, but I found it only gets you so far. I will be happy to answer any of your questions and I'm on here fairly often.
I'm sure it seems like an overload of information, but it actually not that difficult.
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