Chip paint on frame.

[PaulSB]

So do you think nail varnish be ok? Thinking popping down to Superdrug with the misses. Don’t want to go on my own they may think is for myself. Light blue colour suit me fine.🤣

I have repaired small chips on carbon in the past. My approach has been to gently sand the area before applying thin layers of paint building up each layer until the chip is almost filled with paint. Then I apply a couple of coats of clear nail varnish.

This will largely disguise/hide the chip but it will still be visible to close inspection. You need to be very careful only to apply paint and varnish into the chip. If you let it build up on undamaged paint it will look far worse than it does now. Great care over several days is needed.

 

[JtB]

After the first paint chip you can relax and really start to enjoy the bike. There will be more chips to come so personally I’d not bother trying to hide it.

 

[Gillstay]

How do you get them to come outside to see the colour in daylight?

Just threaten them with the medieval two handed broadsword in your cycles emergency maintenance bag.

 

[Smokin Joe]

A tastefully applied decal will hide a chip. On my last build I did not secure the bars in the straight ahead position before fitting the cables, allowing them to freely swing with the shifter clamp chipping the paint on the top tube. To further compound my stupidity I still did not do it and suffered exactly the same fate on the opposite side.

Which is how the frame ended up with two small Union Jacks on the tube.

 

[kiwifruit]

Manage to get a near enough perfect match with an Humbrol modelling paint. Then I will put a bike decal over it.

 

[pawl]

I wonder if these automotive “smart repair” and “chips away” people might be worth investigating. I’ve never had any experience of them myself but the very nature of their work is touching in small areas of paintwork.
No doubt it will cost more than attempting to do a touch-in yourself but if they do the job well and the end result is a good colour match and finish then it would be money well spent.

I used them to touch up some stone chips on my car They do a good job Might be worth asking if they would do bike A friend used them to touch up some chips on his motorcycle.