I have a bare alloy petrol tank which I shamefully admit had some splattered bugs on it for a few weeks before I got round to cleaning them off. When I did clean them off I found a pit in the surface where the bug guts had been. It's rather like a stone chip. At first I thought something must have dropped on the tank but I've never dropped anything on the tank and there is no depression around the hole. I then started to wonder if the splatters insect guts could have become or were acidic and as there is no paint to protect the alloy could this have eaten into the tank. Has anyone experienced anything like this and has anyone got any advice on a possible repair, as its not painted in the first place I can't think of a way to repair it. Thanks
There used to be an aluminium filler (can't remember what it was called) that could be blended into fill scratches and dings and it was virtually invisible when done you could try a restorer work shop to see if they can help.
the closest you will get to halting any further corrosion is to get it to an experienced painter. Depending on how bad the condition is the surface needs cleaning, etch-priming and then painting with a top coat generously enough to enable flatting down/compounding to hide any craters
Devcon is an alloy based repair paste, but I would say that it's darker than bare alloy and not cheap but it would serve to fill the hole or pit. You could try and have a small blob of alloy weld dropped on the mark but you would then need to rub it down and polish it out. It's better to have the tank clear coated to stop this happening again. Dead bugs and bird droppings are often acidic so that is likely to have been the cause and they do need to be wiped off as soon as possible. I used to have a bare alloy tank on a early TZ250 race bike and in some ways they are not worth the trouble leaving them bare, in my case it was easier to repair If I crashed the bike.
Clearcoat is an alloy coating for mostly polished Aluminium it's not the same as lacquer used for bodywork. Eastwood products sold it over here but I think the no longer have an agent in this country, Frost Auto Restorations might sell it though. I used it when I polsihed a car V8 intake manifold and it came as part of their polishing kit at the time.
I see. I only ask cos I've just fitted some alloy mudguards to my Guzzi, and I don't want to go through that cleaning process again...
IIRC from schoolday biology classes, insects have a 'blood' called hemolymph...........I can't recall the main constituents, but I think Sodium is one, Chlorine is another........both of which will damage aluminium.......... .......I also think there were amino acids in the hemolymph which is why (I think) insect splatter is as bad for paintwork as bird cr*p........ ....I read somewhere that splatted insects and bird cr*p can start 'burning' paint and lacquer in as little as ten minutes. AL
generally most aluminium is pretty easy to live with, preserving elderly magnesium is a totally different story.
