Painting Engine Parts and Springs

[Mark_88]

Ford Blue for the block and head...although black looks good too...the exhaust would look good in bright red...but skip the intake...just brush polish it if you want to take the time...

I painted my shorty header with blue high heat paint...but didn't realize that it reaches 1,000+ degrees (or was it 800)...it pretty much evaporated the first time I ran the engine for two minutes...

The VHT is good and so is dupli-color...

 

[BLOODBANE]

Here is the .060 over 302 that I had in my ranger before the 347.....

and....

I used actual auto paint(mix and shoot) on mine. That is the color of the truck so I thought it would look kind of cool in there. Main thing is dont get in a hurry. Take your time with the paint you choose.....
I found a pic of the 347 before it went in and here it is(rattle canned from the engine shop)

....

 

[fishunterx]

Would I be able to get my stock valve cover to look like that?

 

[Mark_88]

not likely...they are steel (except the turbo covers that I think are aluminum) and do not clean up that well...I ended up painting mine (gee, Ford Blue again!)...but it looks good...

 

[fishunterx]

Too bad... Thought it might have been a paint.

Right now my engine is Grease Cake black I don't know yet if I'm going to pull my block 100% or not to go through my engine. The other day I was going to pull my valve cover to look and see why my top end knock was all about, I saw a funny looking bump on the top of the cover. Wondering what it was, I scraped away about 1/4" of grime and low and behold, it was the ford logo!!

Unfortunately the person I got the truck from doesn't care 1/10'th as much about trucks as I do.

 

[Broaner]

I use the following paints for the according applications:

Rustoleum "Rusty Metal Primer" I sandblast every piece that I paint as long as it will come off the frame. Even if the metal you are priming isn't rusty this is an excellent high build primer that accepts the color really well. This of course only if the object to be painted will see heat no higher than 150 degrees or so. Stuff close to exhaust is fine but anything directly touching heated objects will flake or peel. Then I lay down a Rustoleum High Gloss or Semi Gloss Enamel almost always in black. IMO the best color schemes are subtle. I don't like to be flashy. Just like to have a clean rust free coat of jet black on everything so the inspecting eye notices the work but isn't annoyed by a color scheme that they may or may not like. Then its Rustoleum Clear Coat Enamel just to give it an extra layer of protection.

For Exhaust stuff I use the silver Duplicolor 1200 degree stuff. Expensive and it needs to be redone occasionally but it works fine.

For engine blocks and other heated parts I use the 400 degree engine enamel and clear. But as mentioned, with this you need to follow the directions closely when painting otherwise it will turn to absolute shit right before your eyes.

 

[Psychopete]

Blah, Car domain shrunk all of their images. It's been so long, I don't even know if I have the original.

I went w/ yellow on my 2.9L. It doesn't look so great anymore. After / before..

I think I am going to go with really bright green on my 5.0L.

Edit:
And yes that's a Fram oil filter, and yes, I learned the hard way that they suck.

Pete

 

[fishunterx]

Wow, I'm getting some great Ideas, Originally I was going to try and just take the rust off by hand, How much does sand blasting cost? And if I cant afford sand blasting, what's the best way to hand clean an engine part?

 

[gotmudd]

if you go to someplace like autozone [ shucks where i live ] they have inexpensive units. under a hundie i think. i thought i saw one at shucks for like $49 can't remeber if that was on sale or not. then of course you need a compressor and tank, IMO bigger the tank the better, can't remember what psi they run but you don't want to run out of air.

 

[Broaner]

Sandblasting with a small 25lb sand tank only requires ~40psi working pressure so... I'd recomend at least 1 30 gal 10+ cfm compressor with a blaster like that. Anything less than that and you'll be running it all the time and will kill the compressor rather quickly because they aren't designed for %100 duty cycle. I run a 120 gal 16 cfm compressor and it will recharge and turn off even while I'm continously blasting. Also, with blasting its very important to have at least a small drier bowl otherwise the sand will clump in the gun from the moisture and its a serious PITA to clear out. Do not use play sand, its very moist. You need specific blasting sand. Don't get the Menards "Black Magic" either as that stuff is pure shit. Find a local body shop supply store and stock up on 50lbs bags of pure silica.