Ceramic coating integrity

[Rob. Smith]

Last weekend I went to the street machine show at Rosehill race track. I noticed on many of the engines that the ceramic coating had deteriorated and some had even crazed or were flaking off. Most of the crook jobs were on turbo or supercharged engines. I expect that the higher heat may have had an adverse affect. All the coatings were the silver finish. Not the higher temp. black finish. Has anyone had any adverse affects on their Cobras ?

[sambo]

Rob, I sent my headers off to HPC yesterday. I asked for the silver coating so I'm also keen to hear about this.

[BT SNAKE]

Guys, I've used Commercial ceramic coating for three years. The stuff sucks as far as I'm concerned. Three occasions I've had them redone on the RFGT40 and they looked totally like sh!t after three months.
Now I use VHT header paint. It looks really great and it's a heck of a lot easier to touch up.
Plasti-cote also makes a good product.
http://www.vhtpaint.com/flameproof.html

Hersh

[FUNFER2]

Rob,
check out the company below. they've done several parts for me over the years, and have done a much better job than the bigger company's.

They even coated the bumpers, nerf bars and wheels on my 1/4 scale RC sprint cars and it all is beautiful, and no orange peel.

They've done a lot of cobra parts from headers, side pipes, internal & external engine parts, oil pans to even bellhousing.

Great guys & products.

Look up their site and tell them Kevin Gilmore, with the blue cobra sent ya.

Headers are only $170
Side pipes $300

If the parts are used & dirty, they will sand blast them before re-coating.

http://www.moorepower.com/

[sambo]

I just spoke to HPC and they said their standard silver coating is good for 700 degrees. He said something like a 6.0L wouldn't get anywhere near that temp. The only time he's seen a bit of discolouration (not flaking) is on some of the Windsors where the header pipes have very tight bends close together. They have a 12 month warranty but he said if flaking or cracking occurs within 5 years they will redo the coating. This involves a caustic dip to remove the old material first. I guess if that happens you could upgrade to their extreme coating.

http://www.hpcoatings.com.au/pages/hiperext.htm

[cobraman428]

G & T Performance Coatings
(540) 752-6133
101 Juliad Ct, Fredericksburg, VA 22406

They do alot of ceramic coating for cobras and streetrods. My ceramic coated silver sidepipes and headers turned out beautiful and still look great even after 4 years.

[sambo]

We're in Australia guys. Shipping would be a killer!

[Merv and Sharon]

I have had the HPC silver since August 2009 and 4,000 kms and not a mark on them. Brilliant stuff as far as I am concerned.

[jcraigau]

Originally Posted by sambo

We're in Australia guys. Shipping would be a killer!

Although if I bought the headers and sidepipes from the states and had them treated over there THEN shipped here it might be worth considering...

[Gaz64]

Mine and my mates are 8 years old, about 30000km, both look as new, in silver.

My mates glowed a dull red due to incorrect ignition timing and still came back to original finish and lustre.

[750hp]

10 or 12 years ago, I had a set of big block headers done in the "best" coating at the time, which was called ceramic porcelain coating from memory. It felt rock hard and had an amazing shine for about 3 years, then it cracked and flaked and promoted rust spots, etc, etc.

When I had my Cobra headers HPC coated, they went a dull milky silver from the engine dyno session, but stayed that way permanently with no further changes. I wasn't doing it for the looks, so I was more than happy with this. Here's what brand new HPC coating looks like when the pipes were glowing. This run made 805hp at 6000rpm. The sound and picture aren't in sync, and the sound distorts, but you get the idea