Painting Magnesium valve cover

[87tdwagen]

Hi all,
Looking for opinions and experience acquired refinishing magnesium engine valve covers. These were common on M103, M104 and possibly others.

The research indicates that magnesium requires specialized treatment and/or specialized finishes, and not your common variety engine paint. In any event, I had refinished my M104 cover about 5-6 years ago, but some bubbling and popped paint chips have reared their ugly heads yet again. LuckilyI scored a very good shape spare at the picknpull and am considering a more permanent refinishing.

From what I've read there seem to be 2 prevalent approaches to refinishing magnesium, the most traditional being a combo alkaline wash, chromic acid treatment, followed by zinc chromate primer and paint. Unfortunately the chromic acid is hard to find, and is nasty stuff to handle. The zinc chromate paint etc. is easy to obtain.

The second approach that several wheel refinishers recommend is using etching primer followed by 2k primer/paint.

What have you done and found to hold up well over the years?

TIA