Kona Explosif 1993

I bought a 1993 Kilauea earlier in the year and loved it, partly because Mike Muz and I won the Brighton Big Dog retro class this year - with me riding it! This sad specimen of an Explosif turned up in the for sale pages. I though the Kila was great so was interested to see what the 1993 Explosif was like, my in-laws don't live too far from Milton Keynes so I ended up having a family day out and collecting the Explosif in the afternoon. The first wad of money went on lunch at Frankie & Benny's for everyone and then 1/4 tank of diesel!

The Explosif frame and forks was actually advertised for less than the price of the lunch I'd just had :facepalm: so I wasn't going home without it The owner was an avid mountain biker who had had it years and had eventually commuted on it and run it single-speed for a while. It was exactly as pictured in the photo stream of the advert - tired. https://m.flickr.com/#/photos/90909132@ ... 159768133/

Re: Kona Explosif 1993 - project money pit!

Checking in for a burger. Sorry build.

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I tried to clean the rust off and colour match the paint, but came to the conclusion that it was too far gone and frankly I didn't like to original paint job anyway. So, my plan was to re-spray along the same theme but with a lighter metallic blue and brighter silver, but the cost of this turned out to be absolutely enormous so I left it in the garage a while whilst I hatched a plan.... I saw enc's 1992 Explosif and liked the 1992 colour scheme: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=332707

A call round a few powder coaters gave me prices that were far cheaper than two-tone wet paint, but nobody wanted to get near it due to the super-thin tubing. The 1993 Explosif top-tube is 0.5mm thick in the middle, when I told people this they wouldn't take it with shot blast media. A local company stepped up to the challenge and used a far less aggressive media, some sort of oxide I think and did a superb job. They happened to have an agreement with a local powder coaters. These guys would if in America be called a 'Mom & Pop' outfit, they were hidden in the depths of an industrial estate but were 100% spot on! First of all we had a long chat on the phone about colours and they wouldn't paint without me seeing the colours in person :shock: luckily they open at 7:30am so a quick stop off before work got it sorted. They inspected the frame prior to blasting and asked which bits needed to be masked.

The powder coat company actually drove to the blasters to collect the frame and gave it a stunning coat of RAL5022, which is a very dark blue-purple colour and did two sets of Project Two forks and a Velocity Stem in Jet Black. The finish is amazing - it looks like a factory paint job For powder coat it is very thin, in fact the pitting caused by the rust is evident in some places and you can still read the serial number.

A new set of decals and voila! One shiny new Explosif. A new Control Centre headset has been fitted too. Sorry for the crap pics - camera phone in darkness

SP

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More, compare the rusty areas with the current finish. Mmmmm shiny.

Coming soon - full XTR groupset.....

Re: Kona Explosif 1993 - project money pit!

That's a real nice finish and i'm really loving that cool colour as it just " Rocks " mate so i'm certainly pulling a chair up for this build ..

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Nice work mate! Looks great.
Next year's race bike maybe?
Looking forward to seeing this one!

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Cheers, a few pics whilst the sun is out. My phone appears to take better photos than the camera :?

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Camera pics, slightly out of focus- the lens looks clean and I've never had a problem before!

Re: Kona Explosif 1993 - project money pit!

Nice!

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Nice job... in the first set (phone pics) it looks similar colour to what mine is like now.... but nicer ....
im not keen on mine and ultimately itll be the reason i move it on. in your second set it looks similar to mine was originally (pre fade) ... more purple that blue.

looks to be like a nice thick coating and sounds like a ggod service from your powder coaters.

any tips for applying the graphics ? im dreading it

edit: heads up on a humbrol touch up paint ... no 14 , french blue.