Radiator paint

[sak]

Would anybody know just what kind of paint is ok for a full scale radiator? I have some krylon, but I noticed some high temperature tremclad paint at home depot. Would this be nessecary?

Thanks

[dwc43]

If you are talking about a real car, the rad can run over 200* especially in newer cars. High temp paints a must. DO NOT PAINT THE FINS !!!!!! Only spray the tanks. If spray the fins it will over heat. I did it to a race car cause I thought it would look cool to see the blue rad through the grill. I had never had a cooling issue before and liked to have never figured it out. The paint stops up the passages and insulates the metal from the air flow and it over heats. Learned the hard way.

[James Flowers]

I would not paint a radiator at all . Most of them now days are plastic and aluminum anyway. Why would you want to paint it ? The end tanks are the only thing you could paint if you do. If you have a metal end tanks you could polish them and make them look good.

[sak]

its a 72 plymouth and I was planning on only painting the tanks and the support. I had it re-cored and the person that painted it did a rather shoddy job. Alot runs in the paint. They didn't even take the overflow hose off before they painted it. Its mainly the steel side supports that I want to paint, where they painted over the surface rust and its starting to flake off, but while I am at it, I want to paint the tanks as well. Perhaps I will invest in some high heat paint, can't hurt.

Thanks for the advice

Jeff

Edited June 23, 2009 by sak

[VW Dave]

I've used a lot of Eastwood's products with good results; none of their stuff is cheap, but they have yet to steer me wrong. I've yet to use their radiator paint, as the old cars I tinker with don't have radiators, but that would be my choice over hi-temp or hardware store paint.

RADIATOR PAINT

[Mike Chernecki]

I've used a lot of Eastwood's products with good results; none of their stuff is cheap, but they have yet to steer me wrong. I've yet to use their radiator paint, as the old cars I tinker with don't have radiators, but that would be my choice over hi-temp or hardware store paint.

RADIATOR PAINT

Good stuff, I used some a few years ago and was going to suggest it.

[roadhawg]

If you have a metal end tanks you could polish them and make them look good.

Unless the radiator shop was doing the radiator for a show car, the solder joints will look sloppy, which is why they paint 'em in the first place. Yes, radiator tanks polish up pretty, but then you got all those ugly solder joints to deal with.

Black, or Radiator Black, is the standard color, but that doesn't mean you HAVE to use black. See the Nova model in my avatar? This is a model of a real car I built. I painted the shroud gloss black, and wanted something to contrast it, so I painted the radiator with a spray can of Cast Iron.....just to be different! Lol!

By the way.....the reason radiators are black in the first place......the theory is that black absorbs heat, and draws heat out of the radiator.

Edited June 23, 2009 by roadhawg

[CAL]

Unless the radiator shop was doing the radiator for a show car, the solder joints will look sloppy, which is why they paint 'em in the first place. Yes, radiator tanks polish up pretty, but then you got all those ugly solder joints to deal with.

Black, or Radiator Black, is the standard color, but that doesn't mean you HAVE to use black. See the Nova model in my avatar? This is a model of a real car I built. I painted the shroud gloss black, and wanted something to contrast it, so I painted the radiator with a spray can of Cast Iron.....just to be different! Lol!

By the way.....the reason radiators are black in the first place......the theory is that black absorbs heat, and draws heat out of the radiator.

Also the theory behind painting racing engines black, but, "I don't think so, Tim."