heinzboehmer's 2002 Topaz 6MT Coupe

[heinzboehmer]

Brackets are back and, unfortunately, I think I made the wrong call by going with paint.



This specific paint is too glossy and I feel like it just screams "look at me!". Not a fan of flashy stuff. But whatever, it's a part hidden in the engine bay, who cares.

The real problem is with the mechanical properties of the paint. It didn't seem to adhere properly and most of what was under the fasteners ripped off when torquing. It also feels extremely squishy and I do not trust that these parts will stay torqued like they should over time. I don't know if this was caused by poor prep, by the "high temp" paint, by the paint having been laid on too thick or by all of the above.

I would love to powder coat these parts and get it over with, but I'm afraid of accidentally annealing the strut tower brackets during the cure step. I think cerakote makes some low temp stuff, so will probably end up looking into that.

Sigh...

[karter16]

Brackets are back and, unfortunately, I think I made the wrong call by going with paint.



This specific paint is too glossy and I feel like it just screams "look at me!". Not a fan of flashy stuff. But whatever, it's a part hidden in the engine bay, who cares.

The real problem is with the mechanical properties of the paint. It didn't seem to adhere properly and most of what was under the fasteners ripped off when torquing. It also feels extremely squishy and I do not trust that these parts will stay torqued like they should over time. I don't know if this was caused by poor prep, by the "high temp" paint, by the paint having been laid on too thick or by all of the above.

I would love to powder coat these parts and get it over with, but I'm afraid of accidentally annealing the strut tower brackets during the cure step. I think cerakote makes some low temp stuff, so will probably end up looking into that.

Sigh...

I was really surprised when I got my rear RACP bar powder coated. The guy asked what I wanted and I said gloss black, and he looked at me and said “are you sure?” And showed me gloss black, and I thought it looked good. Then he showed me “satin semi gloss” and it was better, then he showed me matte and that was the best of the lot. Very similar to the OE stock strut bar finish so that's what I went with.

I thought the temp for annealing was quite a bit higher than powder coating temps?


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