Race Shield: Keeping Your Paint Work As Good As New

Look at my bike, a Honda ST1300 Pan European. It is different from any other ST1300.
Can you spot the difference? To know the answer, read on.



We man bikers are so funny.
We take so little care of our face, but take such good care of our bikes.

For me, I use the same normal soap that use to wash my feet to wash my face.
But for my bike, I got shampoo lah, wax lah, polish lah, plastic polish lah, bug remover lah, etc etc.

Once when I fell down on a track at 80kmh and slide on the rough tarmac floor for a good distance of5 car lanes, the first thing I did when I stopped sliding is to ran up to see how is my precious bike.I was so heart-pained when I saw its fairing was scratched and broken. Then I started to think of how to repair the damages and how long it will take and how much it will cost. Only then I looked down and saw that I had burned off some skin.

If you are like me, then you would want to preserve the paint work of your bike, whether your bike is new or second hand. You don't want any scratches on your paint work. You don't want your paint work to fade.

Let me share with you one product that I am currently using, that few people know about--Race Shield. I called it condom for bikes.












The idea is basically, you stick clear transparent plastic film onto the vulnerable parts of your bike to protect its paint work. I bought my Race Shield is from www.ar2performance.com.

The Race Shield looks just like any normal plastic film, but it is not. It is very strong.
See:









It is really very difficult to tear it.


So my ST1300 has Race Shield applied to its front fairing, mirrors, side panniers and fuel tank.
These are the most scratchable areas.


I just came back from a ride to nearby Mersing. Already you can see how much dirt, grim, tiny rocks and debris thrown up by the vehicles in front that hit my frontal aspect of my bike.





















Can you spot the transparent Race Shield?
If you see carefully, you can see the line of the edge of the Race Shield running along the top edge of my front headlight. Click on the picture to see it more clearly.

If not for Race Shield, all those grim that you see on my bike would have hit the actual paint work of my work.





















My side mirrors also have Race Shield because it is part of the frontal aspect that takes most of the road debris.
Again, can you see the outline of the Race Shield running around my orange indicator light?
Click on the picture to see it.





















My side panniers also have Race Shield.
There is a wavy scratch mark on the top-front of my pannier.
Courtesy of my own clumsy boot when I swinged my leg on and off the bike.
But fortunately, the Race Shield absorbed the scratch. Otherwise, it would have been on my paintwork.


How much does it cost? I ordered a subset of the possible panels for my bike and it cost about S$300 including installation.

You may say it is not cheap. Well, compared it to spray painting your front fairing alone once.
It comes out to be the same cost. And anyone who rides a bike long enough would see the inevitable effects of road pebbles striking your paint work at high speed and peeling off the paint work like sand paper.

Worse, the aftermarket spray paint work is never like the original paint work. You can never restore back to this quality. Once you scratched your original paintwork, it's gone, forever. So with Race Shield, you can preserve your paint work in its original form.

Well, it's your call. If you are interested, go to www.ar2performance.com to ask.
I am not paid by this ar2 and not related to the company. I merely bought its Race Shield and is a customer.

So far, I am happy as I have already seen it saved my paint work several times, helping to keep my paintwork original. So I am sharing something I think that is useful to fellow bikers :)