Painting My Aluminium Valve Covers

I didn't like the chrome valve covers on my engine and they were pretty badly corroded to boot. I searched for better ones and found a message from Overdrive forum that had some aluminium valve covers for sale. I went to see them and bought a pair.

Too bad that they didn't have Corvette text on them but they were still much better than the old ones. The surface was quite rough but I was planning to paint them anyway. At first I thought about polishing them but in the end they were a bit too pitted.

And a LOT of sanding followed... I started by getting the worst scratches out by wet sanding the covers with a 280 grid paper. Then I wet sanded them again with 400 grid. It took many evenings and a lot of hours to get just one smooth enough to paint.

The one on the left is sanded with 400 grid paper

After sanding both covers by hand, I had abandoned all hope of just polishing them. Besides, I really wanted to see how they would look like painted satin black. So I went to a paint store nearby and bought some aluminium primer and good quality black.

Finally, it was time to paint. I set up a "booth" in our sauna as it had the best ventilation. And it would be the easiest place to clean... I began by spraying two dusting layers of the primer. Those were followed by two heavier wet layers. With four layers of primer, I had a pretty nice, light gray surface.

Four layers of aluminium primer

The instructions on the primer can said that I should let the paint dry for at least a few hours before adding the top coat. So that is what I did. Again I began by two light dusting layers.

First top coat layer

Second dusting layer

And then came two wet layers.

Four top coat layers

The can had just enough paint for the four layers. And finally, after owning the valve covers for nearly six months, they were painted! But not done yet.

The covers were left standing for a couple of weeks and then it was time for the final touched. I decided to remove the paint from the top of the valve covers and polish them. Paint was removed with 280 grid sanding paper. After getting the paint off, I first used 400 grid to smooth the scratches and continued the polishing with 600, 1000 and finally 2000 grid paper. This left a really smooth surface.

And the valve covers were done! I'll just have to add the plastic allen plugs in their holes and put the covers in the car when the engine is back together. And then hope that the paint lasts...