Okay oh wise one when it comes to paint tell me the best way to get this back to pristine condition.

And this

And another.  They are all scratches on my topbox caused by careless contact with buckles on my braces.  I know I should have been more careful but its too late for that.  My question is, do you know of a good source of touch-up paints that could match the colour and would be able to be used by someone less than expert in these matters and still produce a good result or is it a case (no pun intended) of a total respray?

Model code is 5VS1-070 if that helps.

you dont want to hear this Ian.
The only way to get them back to "pristine" condition is to have them resprayed.
If they were a plain colour (red for instance) you MIGHT get a touch up that you could paint on & buff smooth with T-cut or similar.
as they are metalic & Japanese, you will be very lucky to get a touch up that will be an exact match.
RS paints will sell you an aerosol but unless you know what you're doing it could make it look worse.
I'm suprised that they scratch so easily, it doesnt look like there is any primer underneath the topcoat-which is "acceptable" by todays standards.
if they were mine i would be trying to get replacements from Yamaha for shoddy workmanship.
Or sending them to a reputable spray painter who knows what he's doing.they should be stripped, keyed properly, primed, painted & laquered(with a few more coats of laquer to protect from braces, buckles etc)
If you want them sorted, let me know after the Italian job, but i would press Yamaha 1st.
HTH

My thoughts exactly when the first lump came off, no lacquer, no primer just paint straight onto the plastic. There's been a few people complaining about the softness of the paint on the FJR owners site.  Will try Yamaha first but they'll probably just swap the lids and it'll end up just the same.  I'll give you a shout when I get back from Italy or maybe it can be a winter project and do the panniers properly too as they are no doubt the same though because they are knee high buckles haven't been anywhere near them yet.

They probably have been painted then cured in a low bake oven. some manufacturers use primer-some dont.the fact is they havent "keyed" properly which is why they scratch so easily-if you have no luck then we can sort them at your leisure during the winter-by which time most of the paint will have fallen off anyway!

DP correct if im wrong but if the paint is lifting so easily Ian should be carefull about using a hose with a lot of pressure any where near the scratches.

Never a problem.  The only time a hose is used is to rinse off soapy water and then its more of a sprinkler affair than a jet.

you shouldnt really be using a hi pressure hose on a bike anyway-it tends to push grease out of those important little places

which is why I don't  :cool:

Yeh i knew that but ive even had the laquer lifting off one of my cars just with the garden hose on the jet setting.

wasnt a rover was it ging?

Lucky it wasn't a Fiat.... you tend to wash the car off the paint