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Painting valve covers

Freq

Active member
Joined
Mar 8, 2005
Location
VolvoSpeed
So I'm scrubbing all the oil and muck off the valve cover, getting it ready for primer. Originally it was all black with the VOLVO letters in metal. The more I scrubbed the black, though, the more it started to come off. Should I scrub all of it off? It's a super pain in the ass, but so is repainting the cover later on. Thoughts?

Also, I'm painting it Ford Dark Blue and sanding the VOLVO letters back to metal.
 
That would take so much effort, holy crap. And sanding down the paint (and lightly touching the metal) should shine it up nicely.
 
Heres mine, just cleaned it, taped over the letters. 6$ can of spraypaint and viola, done.
ZX.jpg
 
Pics from August.
IMG_1952.jpg

Mmmmmmmm, aircraft stripper.

IMG_1953.jpg

Sandblasted, even the inside.

IMG_1954.jpg

The first colour.

That's still how it sits right now, I've yet to mask off the cross and finish it.
 
That would take so much effort, holy crap. And sanding down the paint (and lightly touching the metal) should shine it up nicely.
It really doesn't take that much effort. Just use painter's tape over it and use an exacto knife to cut around the letters. Took me about 20-30 mins, but I am super picky about that ****. I also polished my letters with a dremel.

I meant to make a thread about this a long time ago, but here are some pics of my process and supplies:

The supplies and starting point:
p10104303157364bb4.jpg

Polishing the letters:
p10104363162234no2.jpg

Taping them off:
p10104373166493qm0.jpg

Primer:
p10104383170952he2.jpg

Finished with 3 coats of paint and 2 coats of clear:
p10104403123115ah8.jpg


It was supposed to go on my silver 242... :-( Now it just sits in the workshop collecting dust...
 
I know for a fact my shaky hands would make this project end in tears. I'll post pictures once I'm done. I won't try air craft stripper until the weather clears up.
 
its alot easier to paint the whole thing and sand the leters later. and if you wana polish the letters after is easier to polished them after than mask them off. paint, sand, done. your letters will look perfect.
 
its alot easier to paint the whole thing and sand the leters later. and if you wana polish the letters after is easier to polished them after than mask them off. paint, sand, done. your letters will look perfect.
My hands aren't steady enough for that. I would end up gouging the paint where I didn't want to.
 
i always use a block with sand paper. if your hands are stedy enough to mask those letters off to a T you can sand them sanding takes 5 minutes.
That works too. I just taped over the whole thing and cut it out with an exato knife which is pretty easy since the letters are raised and you can just trace.
 
For quick and dirty, get the valve cover hot tanked (im always having piles of parts tanked) do a quick sand then paint it with some black wrinckle finish or hammer finish paint. The texture hides any chips in the orignal paint. I then hit the letters with a 3m pad in a die grinder. No masking or careful block sanding, they come out nice and perfect every time.

valvecover.jpg


If im doing something I want to last, i sand blast it, powder coat, 3m letters then a coat of clear powdercoat.
 
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