How to paint your valve cover (and not have it suck)
Apr 10, 2011, 04:49 PM
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How to paint your valve cover (and not have it suck)
It takes time, I would say at least an hour of prep/painting, and then a few hours for the paint to dry, but anyone with some patience, and about $10 in materials, can paint their valve cover and have it look professional. Here is how to do it.
First, carefully remove your coil pack cover, coil packs, upper timing belt cover, and anything else attached to your valve cover. Keep track of where everything goes, and be careful to keep it all clean. Once your coil packs are removed, ball up some paper towels and place them in the spark plug tubes to keep out any contaminants.
Once you are ready, remove all of the bolts from the valve cover (work from the middle out, in a clockwise pattern to prevent anything from tweaking.
Make sure to cover up your engine very carefully to make sure nothing goes in there. I used a few paper towels, and then some shop towels to weight them down, then closed the hood. MAKE SURE TO KEEP IT CLEAN!
Next step is the prep, which is the most important part. I started by cleaning the engine valve cover with some alcohol. Using shop rags, I got most of the grime out, and then I used q-tips to get into all of the fine areas.
Next, grab some sand paper (I used 220 grit) and smooth out any scratches or chips that you may have in the paint. After all of the flaws are smoothed out, make sure to go over and scuff up the remainder of the paint. Paint will stick to smooth surfaces, but it won't last. If you scuff up all of the old paint, the new paint will last a very long time. When you are finished, use more alcohol and clean all of the sanded material away. Use a compressor and blow out any remaining particles.
Now, you are just about ready for paint. Make sure to use some masking or painters tape, and tape off anything you don't want sprayed. I covered up my AN breather fittings, and as well as the oil fill. Once this is done, you are ready for paint. I chose flat black grill paint, but you can use any paint you want (as long as it can handle some heat). The valve cover will get up to around 200+ degrees.
Take your time here, you don't want any runs. Go back and forth, with very light coats, until the entire valve cover is painted. Wait about 10 minutes between coats, and keep adding more paint, checking you didn't miss any spots. After about 3 coats, it looked like this:
Make sure the paint is fully dry before reinstalling it, so that you don't get your finger prints anywhere in the paint. Enjoy your newly painted valve cover, it should look amazing!
--mark
First, carefully remove your coil pack cover, coil packs, upper timing belt cover, and anything else attached to your valve cover. Keep track of where everything goes, and be careful to keep it all clean. Once your coil packs are removed, ball up some paper towels and place them in the spark plug tubes to keep out any contaminants.
Once you are ready, remove all of the bolts from the valve cover (work from the middle out, in a clockwise pattern to prevent anything from tweaking.
Make sure to cover up your engine very carefully to make sure nothing goes in there. I used a few paper towels, and then some shop towels to weight them down, then closed the hood. MAKE SURE TO KEEP IT CLEAN!
Next step is the prep, which is the most important part. I started by cleaning the engine valve cover with some alcohol. Using shop rags, I got most of the grime out, and then I used q-tips to get into all of the fine areas.
Next, grab some sand paper (I used 220 grit) and smooth out any scratches or chips that you may have in the paint. After all of the flaws are smoothed out, make sure to go over and scuff up the remainder of the paint. Paint will stick to smooth surfaces, but it won't last. If you scuff up all of the old paint, the new paint will last a very long time. When you are finished, use more alcohol and clean all of the sanded material away. Use a compressor and blow out any remaining particles.
Now, you are just about ready for paint. Make sure to use some masking or painters tape, and tape off anything you don't want sprayed. I covered up my AN breather fittings, and as well as the oil fill. Once this is done, you are ready for paint. I chose flat black grill paint, but you can use any paint you want (as long as it can handle some heat). The valve cover will get up to around 200+ degrees.
Take your time here, you don't want any runs. Go back and forth, with very light coats, until the entire valve cover is painted. Wait about 10 minutes between coats, and keep adding more paint, checking you didn't miss any spots. After about 3 coats, it looked like this:
Make sure the paint is fully dry before reinstalling it, so that you don't get your finger prints anywhere in the paint. Enjoy your newly painted valve cover, it should look amazing!
--mark
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Apr 10, 2011, 06:42 PM
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Here is the installed product:
To answer the questions above, it was canned spray paint, and yes, I reused the gaskets. I checked them (both valve cover and spark plug tube gaskets) for rips and tears, and then cleaned them before reinstalling.
--mark
To answer the questions above, it was canned spray paint, and yes, I reused the gaskets. I checked them (both valve cover and spark plug tube gaskets) for rips and tears, and then cleaned them before reinstalling.
--mark
Jun 11, 2011, 07:22 AM
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great, i have been planing on doing this forever, but im not too handy with engines. I'm kinda afraid of removing the cover, and dropping something inside LOL. but one of these days, i'll man up and do it LOL
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