Consider this in the long-term-planning area. Right now I'm still wincing from paying the taxes and fees on the 500E, and have to line up wheels and tires -- so the discretionary spending will have to wait for a year or so.

But I can at least do homework in advance. One of the obvious ideas on a 500E is to apply a sprayed ceramic coating like Jet-Hot or Cermachrome (see www.jet-hot.com and www.performancecoatings.com).

Given that the M119 engine is strongly sensitive to ambient temperature, it seems likely that there would be both a performance enhancement from a cooler intake charge, and improved life for heat-sensitive components in the engine compartment, such as motor mounts.

One thing that gives me pause is that I have heard a lot of anecdotal accounts of lower underhood temps from coating the exhaust system. But I'm enough of a scientist that I don't do anecdotes. Hard data! Clinical detachment!

OK, let's search the Web. Doing that produced a bunch of studies which show big drops in underhood temps, on the order of 100F or more. Very impressive! But I then noticed that the -same- study appears over and over again on various coaters' Web sites.

They must have been cribbing from one another, or from the original (described as having been done by Competition Cams in 1991, and shown here: http://www.ram-pro.com/PAGE5.HTM).

Drat! Back to anecdote. Has anyone done this on a hot high-performance mill? Were the results worth the price?

s/b

--