Colony and Newcircle rider Shane Badman recently got his ride pimped.

Leigh “Twaffy” Waddingham was the man who got the biz done. When you spend your days working on high-end Mercedes, Lamborghinis, Mazeratis and Audis, you know you got the right man for the job.

We asked Twaff a little more about what went into this…

1) So Twaff, tell us a little about what you do on a day to day basis…

- I work as a professional automotive re-finisher for Mercedes Benz Queensland. I spend my day mainly working on Mercs as you’d expect but we also get a lot of work for other high-end luxury cars including the ones you mentioned earlier. The works moves anywhere from insurance claims to full-blown restorations where money is no objective.

2) Is working on a BMX frame or parts any different to working on a car?

- Not really. You still follow all the same preparation process and the end result is all the same. The key is the preparation work, you gotta do it perfect the first time otherwise you’ll never get the proper finish.

3) Can you walk us through what you needed to do for getting my Colony Cube sorted?

- We start by stripping it down completely, removing stickers etc, getting all the grease and dirt off and separating all the parts. Then the second step is the liquid strip which we use an aircraft grade paint stripper to remove all the paint. This stuff is high-tech and dangerous: you can’t leave it too long on the metal otherwise it will pit the steel and you can’t ever let it touch your skin! This part you need to be very experienced in as you need to be very decisive and quick to recognise when you’ve used the right amount of time to get the right result.

4) So then it’s ready to paint?

- Yep. Everything is now back to bare metal and once you’ve cleaned off the stripper with thinners you can then give it a nice acid bath to finish the job and brings the metal back to brand new. Now you apply the etch primer and let it sit.

Once it’s set you can sand back the etch and then it’s ready to hang in the booth and paint.

5) The paint job on this thing is wild! I know that it’s got a black base to it with a gold pearl tinge, but how do you get that crazy effect so that it looks like it’s glowing??

- I could tell you it all… but I can’t give away all my trade secrets haha! Working on high-end luxury cars is something else and the processes we use for that are very different and I’ve basically used that to complete your frame and parts. What I can say though is that we use a few different combinations of colour and powder that are unique to Mercedes in particular how we mix it to get the effect.

6) We can see how dope the finish is. I know that you also did another custom paint job for a final prize for one stop of the 2010 DownUnderground contest series, what about other riders that are wanting to customise their rigs – is this something you can do?

- Absolutely, because of how we do it you can usually expect between a 5-10 day turnaround. What I would suggest is people contact Shane at Newcircle (newcirclebmx(at)gmail.com) if they’re interested and also say what effect you’re looking for and colours you want to use and we can then work out a quote and go from there.

Just keep in mind that we can do things with paint that will blow your mind haha!

Twaffy killing it…

Cheers for your time Twaff, see you for sessions soon yo!

Badman.

Spec list:
Frame: Colony Cube 18″
Fork: Colony Cube
Headset: Colony headset
Stem: Colony TLD
Spacers: Carbon Fibre
Bars: Colony Cube 2011
Levers: Colony Transformer
Cable: Odyssey Slic (double brake setup using a knarp)
Brake: Odyssey EVO II
Front wheel: Colony Contour complete (Contour rim with Colony Clone hub)
Pegs: Colony Jam Circle (rear drilled out to 14mm)
Seat: Colony Flatland
Seatpost: Colony Flatland 330mm
Cranks: Colony Flatland Cranks 160mm
Sprocket: Colony Jam Circle 20t
Chain: YBN hollowpin Half-Link Chain
Rear wheel: Colony Contour rim laced to a 14mm Nankai Bamboo
Tyres: Odyssey Frequency G K-Lyte 1.75″ (Tan Wall) foldables
Tubes: Redline Lite Tubes

Mods: Double front brakes yo!

Weight: c.<10kg's I think??

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