Taming the Rust Monster

Wow - almost a month since my last update. I've mostly been busy and out of town. However, I have been forging ahead slowly but surely. I'm at that point in the process where most everything is disassembled, but filthy. I need to clean EVERYTHING, then paint or plate many pieces. It's a tedious process and not initially rewarding... that means it's time to get some new tools to help expedite the job. I picked up a blasting cabinet, a parts washer, a big bucket of glass bead media, and a large tank of solvent. With all of that in hand, I've been cleaning 26 years of gunk off of various brake and suspension parts. It's nasty stuff! I have a long way to go, but a few pieces have managed to cross the finish line: namely, the muffler and exhaust manifolds.

A reference to "DMC-12" right there on the stock muffler.

Originally the tips are shiny. Deviating from originality, I painted the whole thing with POR-20 aluminum. It's not original, but looks a whole lot better than before!

Before and after.

One exhaust manifold after having been bead-blasted down to bare metal and then painted with three coats of POR Factory Manifold Gray. The color is quite close to the bare metal. I've had good experiences with POR's other products, so let's hope that their high-temp coatings hold up equally well.

A box of freshly-blasted bits, ready to be plated.