Author Topic: Painting carburetors  (Read 1907 times)

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Offline bdillworth

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Painting carburetors
« on: March 26, 2020, 01:49:08 PM »
Let’s talk about painting carbs after they’ve been cleaned entirely.


Do or do not and why??!

Offline spotty

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Re: Painting carburetors
« Reply #1 on: March 27, 2020, 03:02:23 AM »
Enamel WILL dissolve in contact with fuel

I know this to be true, it's messy AND you fet to strip the carbs again to clean them properly

Maybe PC would work but you'd want to be doing some serious masking and would the bodies distort in the oven ? Plus you would have to strip them of every tiny component
Same with any baked coating ?

Maybe 2K auto paint but again the masking, wouldn't take a lot to block the teeny little air passages

Have you thought about anodising, rather than an external coating it's an absorbed into the surface treatment, so there's no danger of blocking anything up and no heat to distort

And as far as I know, anodising should be able to be done with a complete set of carbs as it won't affect the steel or brass parts, not sure about the seals and rubber

Anodising works better on unpolished alloy than shiny as it relies on the grain ( or more accurately the exposed surface area ) to absorb into the surface level of the alloy
i blame Terry

Offline calj737

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Re: Painting carburetors
« Reply #2 on: March 27, 2020, 03:46:50 AM »
Anodising works better on unpolished alloy than shiny as it relies on the grain ( or more accurately the exposed surface area ) to absorb into the surface level of the alloy
This is actually not accurate. A polished surface yields a better finish. Anodising is essentially an electro-plating process and does not work well on cast aluminum (hard to yield a consistent finished appearance) but does not care about having a "tooth" to bond with. Cast will anodize, but the appearance of carb body-to-carb body will differ greatly.

To anodize, I think you'd need to disassemble the carbs fully for any type of result.
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Offline spotty

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Re: Painting carburetors
« Reply #3 on: March 27, 2020, 05:24:14 AM »
 :Seems I'm wrong then , just going from a long time reading build articles on bikes
I'm sure that's what they telled me but it ain't the first time I've been wrong
But at least he didn't tell me I'm wrong about anodising over painting
i blame Terry

Offline Stev-o

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Re: Painting carburetors
« Reply #4 on: March 27, 2020, 06:29:02 AM »
I would never consider painting but I have had them vapor blasted, gives a beautiful finish.




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