This is something very easy to do. First you will need to remove your valve cover from your engine. I will assume you can figure that out. If you can't you should get somone else to do the task. This isn't the "How To Take Your Valve Cover Off" page, so i'm not going into detail on that aspect of it. With that said. This is how i did it on my d16z6, this is the SOHC engine. I'm sure you can apply this to DOHC as well..
Once you have removed the valve cover, cover the exposed valve train with a few sheets of newspaper to keep debrits from falling in. Take some degreaser and spray the cover down inside and out to get all the oil off the suface. Take your water hose and rinse it out thoughly. Make sure you rise the under side very well to get all the degreaser off, you wouldn't want to put this thing back on and have degreaser in your oil now would you? The valve cover on my car was already painted, so it had to be stripped. I went to walmart and bought a can of spray on aircraft paint stripper, this stuff is awsome. While i was there i picked out the paint i was going to use also. I picked Dupli-Color 500 degree ceramic engine enamel. The color is up to you. I used low gloss black DE1643. If you have a newer engine like the 96-00 D series engines they are not painted from the factory so you can skip this step. You can do this before the degreaser if you chose. Spray the painted surface with the paint striper and allow it to sit and dissolve the paint. After sitting you can then wipe the paint off with paper towels or whatever you have. If there is still paint left repeat this step. When you are happy take the water hose and spray it down, again make sure to rinse thoughly inside and outside. If you find ruff spots on your valve cover you want get rid of for a nice smooth paint job, sand them down ending your sanding with a fine grain sand paper to smooth it out. Once you have done this rinse again. I suggest using degreaser followed by a rinse to make sure you get everything off. When you have done all of the above you need to let the valve cover dry. I stole my sisters hair dryer to speed this up. If you look on the underside of the valve cover you will see an aluminum plate rivited to the top. This is where air is alowed to flow out through the breather opening. Take the hair dryer and place it where it blows into the biggest hole on the aluminum plate and let it sit, this is going to take a while to get all the water out. WARNING this thing will get pretty hot so be carefull. When all water is evaporated allow the cover to sit and cool. Now it's time to tape a few things off. I used some wide masking tape for this. Take the tape and cut it long enough to cover the spark plug holes, then trim it. I used a razor blade and followed the outside rim of the hole and a guide. I did not tape the bolt holes or the breather hole, but if you want have at it. Now for the letters, I tryed taping them first but that was a pain in the ass. I then coated the letters with a thick layer of chapstick. I figured after the paint had dryed i could then wipe the letters clean. Make sure you keep the valve cover cool if you use chapstick or some other petroleum product. If you don't it will melt an run everywhere. You are now ready to paint. Make sure you shake the spray can well to ensure the paint is mixed. Spray light coats from about a foot away allowing each coat to dry before applying the next. I applyed 5 coats and was very happy with the results. It's very important that you aren't too close to the valve cover when painting, if you are too close you will likely get runs in the paint resulting in a nasty and uneven paint job. Let it dry overnight. When it has dryed you can then wipe the paint off the leters, if you have gotten the chapstick on places you did not want and the paint came off dont worry. Spray some paint in a cup or the paint can top and use a small brush or q-tip to do some touch up. Let that dry and install it back on the engine head and you're done. That's it. |