Show off the little stuff! June 19, 2005, 03:46:18 PM Ever do a little cosmetic mod or repaint or touch-up or whatever that you felt like displaying, but didn't think merited its own thread? Well how about throwing it in here along with a little bit on what ya did to it? Who knows, you might inspire someone else to do something.I'll start it off with this EFI plate I've been tinkering with off and on for weeks now. Originally I shot it with Wal-Mart flat black and some 500 degree clearcoat. However, I didn't like the texture they put on the lettering.. and I wanted to clean it up in general.There's almost too many little steps to list.. but a lot of it was trial and error with this being my first try. I'll pick it up at adding the blue to the Ford oval. I taped off everything but the inside of the oval and shot that with (all of the following is Dupli-Color 500 degree engine paint) Ford Blue, let it sit for a couple days, and then sanded off the raised parts. Taped off just the oval, painted the entire plate in 2-3 coats of gloss black, and let that dry overnight. Took a utility knife blade to se the paint off the top of the lower letters, since it was a pain to sand off even with a quarter-sheet sander. Taped off the raised sides and ends of the plate, and used the sander to sand down the exposed metal.. 60 dry, 150 dry, 400 dry, 1000 dry.. then hand-sanding: 1000 wet, 2000 wet, and 0000 steel wool. Even took some polishing compound to it. (which also cleaned up some scuffs in the black) Then shot the whole thing with 3 solid coats of clearcoat. There's a slight orange peel evident on the letters, but it's only noticeable from about 1' away.The pics don't do it justice, but they'll give ya a decent idea. The "5.0 LITER EFI" is now pretty close to mirror shine. (at least as clean as your average exterior badge) I like it enough that I'm considering finding more and putting one in place of the HO plate on the Lincoln. (of course, I could polish that one up too.. and see how it comes out)Only thing I can't decide is which manifold I like it better on.. so I took a pic of it on top of each one. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #1 – June 19, 2005, 04:04:22 PM I like it on the red one. Do the same with the blue oval. I know the whole red dosent go with the rest of your engine... So go with the blue. Yeah you should do the same with the oval. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #2 – June 19, 2005, 04:17:49 PM You kinda lost me there on the "Do the same with the blue oval" bit.Well I just started thinking about how I might paint the HO plate, since I have it laying around and I still have the itch to mess around with this stuff. I took a pic of it and did a crude drawing in Paint, of what I have in mind. I am thinking about mixing a little red, black, and blue.. and giving the raised surfaces the same polish as the letters on the SO plate. I just did lines instead of filling everything in.. and the "5.0" would be black just like the "HO" would be. The Ford text would be blue like the oval, although obviously lighter than the color I used. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #3 – June 19, 2005, 05:09:22 PM I was saying polish the ford emblem but sure. I dont like the HO plate as much. I would do the letters and the lines red and everything else black and just color in the ford emblem blue maybe. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #4 – June 19, 2005, 05:09:56 PM I think it looks better on the blue one (but heck I like Ford blue). I did something similar to my SO's top plate when I had it on my engine. I sanded the raised edge around the plate so it was silver taped it off and then sprayed the inner part black. I then used ford blue to paint the oval and let it dry. Then I did something that turned out good but was a pain in the a$$ to do. I hand painted the FORD script and outer oval white. Looked good but it was hard to keep the white paint from getting on the blue. I also sanded the "LITER" and "EFI" to make it shine but I painted 5.0 in Ford red. Really looked good but I ended up giving it to a friend for his Stang. Problem was he sold his stang so I can't get the plate back. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #5 – June 19, 2005, 05:14:33 PM I did polish the Ford emblem. The blue paint you see is inside the depressed areas of the emblem, and I polished the raised parts.I'm already working on the HO plate. Even just sanded down with 320 dry, it looks a hell of a lot better. Taping it off to paint the black parts now. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #6 – June 19, 2005, 05:14:40 PM Oh almost forgot for the HO see if ya can find a 86 HO top plate in a junk yard. They looked the same as the SO plate but had a HO in the space between the Ford oval and 5.0. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #7 – June 19, 2005, 05:17:36 PM My mistake I should have said it better. I ment that I polished the raised border that goes around the indented section where 5.0 liter efi sits. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #8 – June 19, 2005, 05:21:26 PM I should've specified that I was responding to Haystack on that one, sorry. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #9 – June 19, 2005, 05:57:34 PM Because my '88 XR7 was medium scarlet red, I painted the intake setup the same. I loved the way it looked.I also had a custom plate on top of the manifold with black lettering. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #10 – June 19, 2005, 06:04:21 PM I should take a moment here to point out that the title of this thread is NOT, I repeat NOT an excuse for Shawn to expose himself. OK, back to the car stuff. :p Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #11 – June 19, 2005, 06:06:28 PM Painted my cobra intakes duplicolor metalcast red,looks just like candy apple. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #12 – June 19, 2005, 06:31:51 PM I like that red. That's giving me the itch to use those metalcast paints at some point. Don't know on what, though.. but I'm sure I'll find something.BTW, this thread isn't just limited to minor engine details. If there's anything you feel like showing off.. maybe an interior part you thought came out well, but didn't do enough interior work to merit a thread of its own, (for example) let's have it. I meant this as a repository for all types of little cosmetic jobs. Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #13 – June 19, 2005, 07:10:56 PM Quote from: Bird351I should take a moment here to point out that the title of this thread is NOT, I repeat NOT an excuse for Shawn to expose himself. OK, back to the car stuff. :pyoure right...its not an excuse...ITS A REASON! Quote Selected
Re: Show off the little stuff! Reply #14 – June 19, 2005, 07:32:47 PM Yea that red really kicks ass,figuring that the purple,blue and green should come out candy just like mine did, would love to see somebody else try it.Start out with the metalcast primer first though,then paint and clear.Must have but at least 5 coats of prime,10 coats of paint and 4 coats of clear,but as you can see the finised product is well worth the time. Quote Selected
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