What have you used to prep and paint your engine that worked and held up. I'm getting ready to paint mine and want to see if there is something new.
I wire wheeled mine to bare metal then painted with Dupont urethane, then pearl, then clear. It worked great. Its not in the pickup yet, but I have no reason to believe it won't hold up.
i paint all my engines with base/ clear dupont paint did 6 so far with no problems. prep as you would with any metal part.
if your engine is bare metal and all togeather, i use a cutting torch over all the iron parts lightly to flash the mosture out of the iron. u want it warm to the touch but no hotter. u can see the water leave the iron. next coat with a good 2 part epoxy primer then coat with the color of choice.i have done this miny times and the pain stays put until u take it apart an vat the block.
Most engines have some old paint on them. The best way to ***ure it will accept paint and stay on, is to Needle gun the entire cast iron and then wipe it down with a good thinner. Paint with a good primer and use One Shot paint----You won't have any problems if you do these steps.--TV
I never thought about heating the iron, that sounds like a good idea. In the past I have had good luck with activated enamel car paint or a good B/C system with very good results. It seems to work better if the overall thickness of the coating is kept as thin as possible.