Has anyone tried painting their engine without dismantling it?

I cant decide whether to paint my engine or not, it would be nice cosmetically but I don’t think its desperately in need of paint.

As the engine appears to be sound and runs fine I don’t want to strip it to paint it. So I wonder how hard it is to paint it with the heads, exhaust manifolds, water pump etc in place

in my books, building it is more important then making it look nice. As such, i will finish it and then take it apart bit at a time to paint it as and when i can be arsed!

a lot needs doing though, the hubs diff and engine gearbox as a start.

I dont want to build it and then take it apart again. Id rather take my time and then once its built spend the time improving it once i know how it drives.

As the Eagle SS is now a classic the more I do now adds more value.
Also I want to do as much as possible whilst i have the body off

[Edited on 21/12/03 by DrEagle]

I didnt take my engine apart to paint it.

All I did was take off the manifolds and rocker covers - which is hardly dismantling.

My rusty grey paint flaked engine looked great after just a bit of paint here and there. Nice black block and heads and red rocker covers.

Manifolds tend to fade (used manifold black) after a year or two even without car on road!

I wouldnt scrimp - no point having a swish car on outside and a crappy looking engine under the bonnet - i mean - you are gonna show off your handywork once its done.......its like wearing a suit with 10 day old underpants.

atb

steve

I'm not inclined to bother painting our engine. Lots of bits bolted, screwed and so forth onto it, and I'm paranoid about stripping threads in the aluminium block.

If we want to strip it at some point I expect we'll paint it.

As for looks, it would be nice, but the two parallel ROVER rocker covers look pretty good au naturel in my opinion

would be sexy to have them pearlescent anodised though..

before and after
Rescued attachment painted.jpg

It's much less of an issue with an ali engine anyway, it just needs a good clean and then stays nice. It'd be nice to maybe paint the rocker covers and get raised bits machined but the cast ali ones look nice anyway as blue said.
Our Sierra Ghia 4x4 had it's block painted red with grey rocker covers, not sure if that was standard or not.



Those engine mounts will need a bit of cleaning up though I think!

[Edited on 22/12/03 by mackie]

We I went for it! Its not as good as painting when rebuilding but it will do for now, and looks loads better than the rusty / flaky / greasy lump it was.

Halfords Very High Temp paint for the manifolds.

Aluminium Engine Enamel for everything else.

And a roll of masking tape!


Now any suggestions on what paint to use for the rocker covers and that gold thing on top? (don’t know what its called!)


Before
Rescued attachment Engine1.jpg

Cleaned
Rescued attachment Engine2.jpg

Now
Rescued attachment Engine3.jpg

Stephen

What paint did you use for your rocker covers?

The EFI Picked out in red looks brillaint - how did you do it? Come and do the Ford Logos on my rocker covers, please....

i used plasticoat paint from halfords.

still bright red but hasnt been on road.

the EFI was done with a pot of paint and a brush. Cant remeber where I got the paint - think it was a pot of plasticoat or summat like it from a diy or craft shop.

im crap at artwork. really crap. I just painted over the raised letters with a fine art brush and it came out good. silver is plasticoat too.

atb

steve

Hi!
Maybe little bit off toppic but how do you clean aluminium? I tried to use THE TOOL with quite a har brush, but it seemss to leave small scratches. When i use electric drill with brush, it's hard to clean anything -too weak.
And the main problem is - how to clean gearbox which has quite small square pattern all over? I'm quite desperate... Seems that it coud take many hours
How do you think - should I paint it or leave as is?
Thanks.

I just used a de-greaser (gunk) then blasted everything with a pressure washer.

atb

steve

What about aluminium oxide? Will that technique get rid of that too??

I'm guessing prob not. (but hoping it will!!)

As soon as you get rid of it it'll come back again
Our ali engine appears to be covered in little dusty white speckles, I assume it's a reaction with water but it appears to brush or wipe off so it's not a big deal.

Can anyone recommend an anodising/machining service in the southeast? I'd like to know how much it'd cost to get our rocker covers/plenum chamber anodised or polished and the raised ribs machined to a machined finish (well duh )

i painted the plegnum silver before picking out the letters in red.

paint hasnt flaked or anything - just used normal plasticoat primer


atb

steve