63 Grill finish

[Zimm63]

My 63 continues to come together slowly after paint. A lot of the shiny stuff is done and back on the car. Now I am getting ready to work with the grill and headlight set ups. The turn signal housings have been rechromed and are ready to go.

Can anyone tell me what the level of finish is on the grill and headlight units. It looks like the edge is bright chrome with a duller finish everywhere else. The headlights have a bright chrome bezel on the leading edge, with grey paint behind that.

What have people done to refurbish these part? They are past the point of simply shining them up with polish, although the headlight bezels cleaned up well.

The rest of the car is looking good, I want the grill to equal the rest of it.

As a wild thought, has anyone done these parts in black? My car is black and it might look good as a little custom touch. I did that on a dark green 70 Camaro when I was a kid and really liked the look.

All advice welcome. Pictures of nicely done grills would be great.

Zimm

[Guest REX STALLION]

. I had my grill re chromed and now will paint inside the egg crate with argent silver. the headlight buckets are half chrome with the back half painted argent silver.

Regards, Scott

[Paul K.]

When you paint the grille, paint it from behind or the inside out.

[CheezeMan]

Krylon's Dull Alluminum #1403 paint is a very good match. That is what I used on my headlight rings.

[Guest REX STALLION]

When you paint the grille, paint it from behind or the inside out.

Paul, I think I would put masking tape over the front and spray the egg crate from the inside. Thats what I`m going to try anyway.

Scott

[steelman]

As a wild thought, has anyone done these parts in black? My car is black and it might look good as a little custom touch. I did that on a dark green 70 Camaro when I was a kid and really liked the look.

Zimm

Didn't find a black 63-64 with a painted grille, but found a few examples of painted grilles. Some worked better than others. Sometimes a picture can serve as a reminder of what not to do. Hope these help.

[alini]

So the factory original color combo is chrome leading edge and a 'dull silver' finish? Or satin blackish??

[CheezeMan]

Paul, I think I would put masking tape over the front and spray the egg crate from the inside. Thats what I`m going to try anyway.

Scott

Scott, let us know how that turns out. Another solution was to paint it all, then after drying, use a buffer to buff off the paint on the front edge. Not sure, but the factory may have done it that way.

[lrlforfun]

OK Riviera People: I can see painting the entire grille front and back sides and go over the chrome squares with some trippple ott steel wool. As long as the paint is reasonably dry I'm thinking this would work nicely. In fact I'm going to try it myself. I will let everybody know how it works out. Mitch

[RivNut]

Mitch,

When I painted the valleys on my finned rocker covers and valley cover, I wrapped a single thickness of paper towel around a paint stir stick and poured just a little lacquer thinner on the paper towel. I was able to draw the towel (wrapped around the stick) across the ribs and remove just that outer layer of paint on the ribs. Of course the grill has two levels of chome and you wouldn't be able to get into the cross sections that way. Lots of ways to get it done. Makes you wonder what they did at the factory to get it done quickly. ?????

Ed

[mhnova65]

Zimm,

I've tried many of these suggestion but unfortunately, nothing substitutes doing it the hard way.

Painting the grill first and then trying to take the paint off the edges with 000 seems great.....until you try it. If you don't hit the paint at the precise time, it either smudges or it doesn't want to come off prompting more elbow grease. This becomes more work that it is worth. Plus the harder you push on the steel wool, the more you start to take off paint on the inside edge as opposed to the outer edge itself.

Wiping with solvent is equally frustrating. If you do it with a rag, the rag tends to sink into the crates and take the paint off the insides. I suppose you could do what Ed suggest with the paper towel and stir-stick but the front end parts were too elaborate to work for me when I did my parts (as opposed to just a bunch of flat, level surfaces).

Taping the front edge only and shooting the paint from behind sounds great too.....until you do it. The crates are too deep and you will not be able to get enough paint on the leading edges; which is where you see it and and the portion that will be most exposed to wear and the elements).

After countless hours of trying to find an easier way of doing it.............I realized the hard way was the best and only way; You must mask each edge.

3M makes a thin vinyl masking tape used for detail masking (making flames and other paint effects). I found the 1/8" tape perfectly covers the horizontal ribs of the front components. The 1/4" works well for the vertical ribs onthe headlight assemblies. Those two rolls and a new razor blade and you are off to the races.

Pain in the Arse?? Yes.

Takes a lot of time??? Absolutely

Worth it?? Without a doubt.

Reason why this is the best way to go; Once you spend the time to properly mask the components, you are now free to paint from any angle and side. VERY important when you are tring to get paint inside small boxes and cover the sides evenly. It works so well you'll shed a tear removing the tape because it was more work than any other part of the project!!!

I was going to use the Ardent Silver but it was too expensive for my taste. I looked into the Krylon Dull Aluminum but it was not suggested for exterior applications (although some on this form have used it and say they have had no issues). I settled on Rustoleum's Professional line (the silver rattle cans) in dull aluminum. The color is a bit more silver/ deeper tone than the others but it looks nice and really covers well. Especially helpful if you have minor pitting that you want to try and fill a bit.

When you are all done with the paint, let it dry for several days to get a good cure. Then polish up the edges using 000 steel wool with a paste metal polish (someone else recommended that to me on this forum and WOW does it work great.....as good as the chrome will ever look without re-chroming).

Best of luck.

Mark

[RivNut]

Question. How do you paint (black) the parts of the grill where there's a web between the bars instead of an opening?

Thanks.

Ed

[mhnova65]

Oops.....forgot about that part, Ed.

Before polishing, I painted the webbing between the bars using various artist brushes (whichever size was needed to get into the space) and a small can of Rustoleum Satin Black. You can buy the little cans (8oz. ?) wherever they sell Rustoleum.

Mark

[68RIVGS]

Good write up Mark, and definetly a time consuming PITA !!

It will probably take more time to prep and mask than the actual paint application, but it will turn out great and you can rattle can it from any direction. Just apply thin coats so you don't get a thick build up on the shiny chrome edges.

I used satin black, sign type vinyl inserts, cut to fit, on my '68 Riv plastic 'egg crate' grill for the black out areas.