The Zephyr Zone

I'm currently rebuilding my 1100 which was originally Candy Atlantic Blue, whilst I love the colour I have been thinking about maybe a colour change as the bike needs re-spraying.....Now it maybe something to do with my age (nearly 50 ) but I do like 70's style colours and I'm really liking the Kawasaki Midnight Purple used on the early ZRX1100...I think it could look really good on the zephyr?? There are some really stunning candy pearl custom paint colours out there or should I play safe and paint it blue again,

So what do you guys think, has anyone painted their zeph a wacky colour or something different, just looking for some opinions

cheers eddie

look good on a zeph wouldn't it..

Seeing you asked, myself I'm not a fan of lets call them the 'candy' colors (pinks, purples, etc.)

But I won't just default back to a basic blue. If I was going to totally repaint I'd look to the Sanctuary Zephyrs and 900's for inspiration. You can then see what the finished product is going to look like. I'm the first to admit I'm not creative with color schemes so would just copy shamelessly.

While this bike has a black engine which is probably mandatory for this paint scheme to work, I think its the best looking one I've ever seen ......



Google 'sanctuary Kawasaki', lots more great examples and ideas. This green and silver paint scheme with the silver engine really works for me.

http://www.ac-sanctuary.co.jp/rcm-list/gallery/zephyr/rcm252/

Eddie wrote:I'm currently rebuilding my 1100 which was originally Candy Atlantic Blue, whilst I love the colour I have been thinking about maybe a colour change as the bike needs re-spraying.....Now it maybe something to do with my age (nearly 50 ) but I do like 70's style colours and I'm really liking the Kawasaki Midnight Purple used on the early ZRX1100...I think it could look really good on the zephyr?? There are some really stunning candy pearl custom paint colours out there or should I play safe and paint it blue again,

So what do you guys think, has anyone painted their zeph a wacky colour or something different, just looking for some opinions

cheers eddie

look good on a zeph wouldn't it..

attachment midnight purple zrx.jpg

Its your bike eddie, go with your gut feeling i say

I have looked (drooled!) over the Sanctuary bikes and Google imaged zephyrs for a long time and while they're are many stunning designs, I'm thinking a plain simple one colour paint job because that's just what I prefer on the zephyr. I know stripes etc look good but everybody these days seems to be sticking on Zed decal sets too Kawasaki's old and new....with varying degrees of success!!

Besides I've already got a 78 Z1000 with a Z1b paint scheme so don't want a Zephyr clone of it



Anyway keep your ideas / pictures coming, always good to see lovely zephyrs

cheers eddie

Black ones are faster

Bigzeph wrote:Black ones are faster

One advantage of a black paint job is the bikini faring below would bolt straight on and match if you were interested in such a thing. Pretty inexpensive. Needs a little simple modification to stiffen it up, IMO.

I'm about 90% of fitting one to my 750 (a D1 in the standard silver/black colors) and if I do say so myself it looks quite good. Way better than any of the all clear headlight mounted ones I've tried.

How effective it is as a screen ...... can't say yet.

Bigzeph wrote:Black ones are faster

Well you would say that wouldn’t you

Freddy wrote:

Bigzeph wrote:One advantage of a black paint job is the bikini faring below would bolt straight on and match if you were interested in such a thing. Pretty inexpensive. Needs a little simple modification to stiffen it up, IMO.

I'm about 90% of fitting one to my 750 (a D1 in the standard silver/black colors) and if I do say so myself it looks quite good. Way better than any of the all clear headlight mounted ones I've tried.

How effective it is as a screen ...... can't say yet.

I had the same one on my 550 for a bit. I found it to be fairly useless as wind protection, unless you tucked down behind it.

I thought it looked a bit large on the 550, may fit the 750 lines pretty well. I took it off after a few weeks because I liked the bike better without it.



As for custom colors, I painted mine Emerald Green Metallic, off of one of the late model Toyota's. It almost looks black in indirect light, and pops a nice green/gold flake in the sun.

Great paint on that 550, that's exactly the effect I'm after where it looks almost black but "pops" a nice metallic when the sunlight hits it, the original Candy Blue was the same and mine was often mistaken for looking black.

I'm not a fan of bikini fairings myself, well not fitted to naked bikes anyway, if a bike is designed with one from new then fair enough as it will look right and probably work quite well too look at the Kawasaki ZRX it looks great, but a fairing stuck on a Zephyr? why would you....you wouldn't put a fairing on an original Z900 surely, and if you did you should be shot!!

sorry fairing lovers!!

Thanks.

Don't know if you would consider it sacrilege, but Honda has a beautiful purplish burgundy called Burgundy Night Pearl that has a great flop in the sun. It's another that looks really dark in the shadows but pops in sunlight.

Using paint (and paint codes) off of existing cars and bikes makes it easy to get paint mixed, especially if you have to do a repair later.