Engine bay color?

[Fast92RS]

Im going to be taking my engine out soon to do my 383 swap. Im going to finish undercoating the car. Should I repaint the engine bay the color of the car or should I go all black.

[V]

IMO, match the color of the car

[BonzoHansen]

What every factory did, IMO. They did body color on 3rd & 4th gens, right?

[V]

3rd gens got body color...
4th gens.. well they got cheap. My SS was more of a light gray instead of pewter, and afaik, 4th gens got no clear coat in there. so the paint doesnt hold up too well. Thats why i sprayed my car. And now it looks tons better.

[BonzoHansen]

Interesting. Thanks.

[maroman88]

ehh ur cars a dark color so black wouldnt look bad...

[Fast92RS]

Originally Posted by maroman88

ehh ur cars a dark color so black wouldnt look bad...

Thats what I thought. The former owner started to paint it black. I have some slight surface rust to fix under the battery and by the brake booster before I paint it.

[NJSPEEDER]

are you painting the engien or anything to add some show appeal? or jsut swapping the motors and not worrying about it?

if you are making some changes under the hood that are for appearance as well and the block/heads/intake/valve cover/hiding wires and all that stuff are going to be all fresh and prettied up, i would say go with a gloss black so that the engine is the focal point when you lift the hood the engine is the focal point.
if it is jsut an engine swap, just match the body and you will have a clean look without a bunch of extra time and effort invested.

[Fast92RS]

Well the block will be painted black. The heads will stay natural aluminum. The chrome valve covers will stay and the superram intake will go on. I think I may get the intake and acc. brakets powder coated silver (bright chrome finish), and just try to clean up everything.

[NJSPEEDER]

i would just stick with the body color then. it will benice looking but it desn't sound like you are planning to go through all the trouble of making a "show" engine compartment.

[BonzoHansen]

I don't know if you can paint, but if not, black is easier if you are OK with rattle cans. Krylon semi-gloss black or rustoleum 7777 semi-gloss black can look good.

[Fast92RS]

If I go with black Im going to use POR-15 with there chassis coat black.

[BonzoHansen]

I've used POR-15 (but not the chassis coat). You need to get to bare metal, then use their cleaner and etcher (metal ready) for it to stick well.

If you do it right, you can paint over it. When it is tacky, mist it with etch primer, then you can paint over it with rattle can once it dries. Again,. Krylon (dries fast) looks good. I did the firewall of my 77 liek that, but with john deere blitz black. I think it came out good.

[Fast92RS]

Ive used it before you only need bare metal for the por15. Which I will use for the rusted areas then the chassis cote over everything or I can use the self etch primer over the por 15 and repaint with the factory color. I did my rear axle with por 15 and there black cote and I did my factory a arms with it.

[BonzoHansen]

Cool. I know some guys have reported POR15 peeling when used on clean bare metal.

I just used POR15 on my rear axle housing too.

[deadtrend1]

i agree with sped'dur. The body color looks great if the motor your putting it wont blind you with chrome when you open the hood....

i jsut can't see having a dark green engine bay. black gives it that clean look as well

[WildBillyT]

Originally Posted by BonzoHansen

Cool. I know some guys have reported POR15 peeling when used on clean bare metal.

That would be me. I've used it on 3 cars now. Very little of it will be on the '69. Probably only on the water pooling prone areas.

Your metal will have to have some form of "tooth", be it rust or rough sanding. Metal Ready can help, but if it's clean metal don't bother with the POR. It will come off in sheets and really piss you off. I've had it come off of a freshly sandblasted subframe. Yes, I knew what I was doing.

I've had great results using Rustoleum Professional Clean metal primer and semi-gloss black.

[Fast92RS]

Its 50/50 on the vote and I posted this on the thirdgen site as well and its 50/50 there to. I can see both points. Body color would look better but paint it black would eaiser. My plan is to make the car clean and nice but not a show winner.

[karr95]

I would go with black. If you have to touch someting up down the road it will be a lot easier to match black than body color.

[Teds89IROC]

Originally Posted by BonzoHansen

I don't know if you can paint, but if not, black is easier if you are OK with rattle cans. Krylon semi-gloss black or rustoleum 7777 semi-gloss black can look good.

rattle can rustoleum semi-gloss black here. I did it with the engine in the car; I had some rot holes to weld patches over on the wheel wells so I figured I'd make everything nice. I removed a lot of stuff and also used a lot of newspaper Don't mind all the loose wires, they were temporary lol

[Fast92RS]

Yeah I think Im going to go with black. I know some people are not going to like it and some will but I want to thank everyone for there opinion.

[BonzoHansen]

I don't think you can go wrong either way. Good luck & post pics.

[CALL911]

Go black!

[unstable bob gable]

I like black. Nice, basic tuff guy look!