Painting/powdercoating valve covers

[GoldHawg]

I would like to paint my SR20DET valve cover the same color I will paint the car (it will be a modern color likely with pearl), but I would like the toughness of powdercoating. Can you paint a valve cover and then powdercoat it with clear? If that can't be done, is there any clearcoat that is very hard and durable so it stays looking great for a long time?

[RCMike]

It really should not see much wear in there. I would be a little worried about heat changing the color on a turbo car, but you could run an oil cooler to keep the temps down..a good oil catch can will help a lot with keeping it clean.

[sfdaugherty]

Jeff: Powdercoating needs something metallic to adhere to so I' d be skeptical that it would stick over paint. I should try it someday to see if it's possible. Although I've powdercoated two SR20 valve covers without incident, Kevin D. had a valve cover professionally powdercoated and it wasn't completely cleaned after sandblasting and ruined a brand new, BEAUTIFUL, SR20DET. It is VERY difficult to get all the sand out of all the cracks and crevices.

Mike has a good point but since you will be running an Autech NA engine, you won't have the turbo heat to worry about. I assume you're moving forward with a coil-on-plug (COP) conversion like I did so you're using an S15 turbo cover (smaller spark plug holes for the S15 COP are unique among SR20's).

Shannon

[RCMike]

If its NA, I wouldn't worry at all about heat... unless you are doing lap after lap at high rpm, they just don't make that much heat.

Just run a catch can to catch the oil vapor and youre good

[Vinnyz]

Automotive paint cannot withstand the required oven temp needed to cure that PC clear. They make a thousand colors for PC these days.....sure you can find one of them to be just right or even compliment things?