Quote:
Originally Posted by mach0415
You souls have polished and clearcoated it, but that's b/c I think shiny metal is sexy. And it depends on what the theme of the car and engine combo is. I would have at least polished the he'll out of the star and then taped it off. Then clearcoated the whole thing after painting the rest. But that's MO. FWIW, hehe  |
i actually tried polishing first. here was my process once the cover was off its engine:
-simple green
-engine degreaser
-simple green with a toothbrush
-engine degreaser with a toothbrush
-more simple green
-fine wire brush
-coarse wire brush
-fine wire brush again
i'm not sure what it is but those 30 year old blemishes from old oil being baked in and such just don't go away. i got this thing more than 100% perfectly clean, and even removing the surface with a wire brush does not remove the stains. it defies explanation.
so i used engine primer which is meant for this stuff, then engine enamel. i was going to mask the star off but its just not practical to do a good job. what you see is the ridges of the star and the lettering have been sanded to be bare metal. it looks REALLY good in person. i'm debating whether it would be worth it to do a few of these and offer them for sale, it's really truly a thing of beauty.