Technical how to you get an engine to look like this????

Do these engines have hundreds of hours in grinding/filing or is there a trick to get one to take paint like this?

 

Grinding, sanding, use of filler primers, are how they do it. Then you must never fire the engine. Oil, gas, and heat will make it look used quicky.

 

If it ain't leaking ,it ain't working.

 

It takes lots of hours of hard work on your part or pay out a stack of Benjamin Franklin's to have someone else do the job. HRP

 

Naaah...ALL Nailheads look like that!

 

You beat me to it!
All nailheads look that great!

 

Ask @Roothawg . His personal hobby is grinding engine blocks smooth.

 

I think we have a little way's to go Mike.

 

Yes, they do. I have this affliction. I start with the bare block before machining. I use a stacked disc wheel on a 4.5” grinder. I take off the casting flash and remove the porous casting. Polish it until it looks like a new nickel. I use a die grinder with different sizes of flapper wheels.

I repeat the process on the heads, water pump etc. I use an epoxy primer and paint with regular automotive paint.

It takes a while, but to me it’s worth the extra hundred hours. I usually do it while I wait on parts or run out of money. It keeps me involved and moving forward even when the coffers run dry.

 

When I did the SBC in my old roadster, I would estimate 40 hours grinding, plus high fill primer, plus sanding, plus Imron. Never discolored, stained or anything else. Simple Green and the water hose had it looking new every time.

 

Money and time.

 

I did the block in the coupe smooth. When I took it to the machine shop they said it was the cleanest block they ever saw. LOL.

 

And like mentioned above, don't crank it.

 

I smoothed one about a year ago. When I took it to the machine shop, the owner had every guy in the shop come look at it. I was kind of embarrassed. I know they were all thinking I was NUTS!

 

Just make sure it doesn't have any cracks in it first.

 

You are so right. Check the head bolt holes as well. I spent a bunch of time on a block my dad traded me for. It ended up having corrosion issues in the head bolts. Wasted about 40 hours…

 

Trick is to always keep the spray can moving in a back and forth motion.....

 

While I dont bother to polish them, I have always used epoxy primer and urethane paint and never had an issue from heat discolor etc. High temp paint not required

 

This post really resonated with me. Cars are expensive, but there's always a lot of work to be done that doesn't cost a dime. Use elbow grease when your pockets are empty to make things nice.

(I should do more of that )

 

Old boss had a 64 savoy he was building and decided he would smooth the engine.

We had countless hrs grinding, smoothing every inch of that motor. Every bracket etc was smoothed. We used a die grinder and started with 60 grit pads down to 220 grit pads on the water pump, housing etc.

We used no fillers just sanding disc and scotch Brite disc's. Then a light coat of primer followed by a light tan paint.

Once we did the engine, we started on the 727 trans.

That rb motor looked great, never installed it though, he lost interest in the project and sold it all.

Didn't get any pics either, shame on both counts....

.

 

Wow! I don't have that kind of time to do that. Even if I did I wouldn't.
My engines when rebuilt look like they already have several thousand miles on them!

Very nice work! A museum piece for sure!

 

Some folks port-n-polish their race heads on the inside. Then there's me.

 

You know what they say....if it don't go chrome it .....nuff said

 

Even if you don't want to go crazy grinding and sanding, there is a huge difference in the appearance of real automotive BC/CC versus rattle can engine enamel from Auto Zone.




I did no sanding whatsoever on this 350 crate engine, and just elected to seal it in HOK KD3000 and shoot it in Shimrin2 BC/CC. If the engine was in a hot rod that was out in the open I'd have probably done some block prep and sanding, but stuffed in a full bodied car with full accessory drive, it's just not that important to me.

 

BC CC isn't traditional is it ?

 

Mark,

Your Cadillac engine was what started me saving pix of engines on my computer. I now have hundreds (and hundreds) of engine pix. This is the very first engine pic I saved:

 

Neither are tunnel rams, but there is one on the car in your avatar....

 

Working on the wife’s 56 Chev 350, I would and do come away with bark off my hands and arms from the casting flash on the block and heads.
Now, I at least grind and smooth out any flash and round all edges and corners of the blocks and heads, it looks tidy,takes not a great deal of time and I find I don’t swear so much working on them.