jay'szo6

I remember seeing some vettes with painted cowls. Ya know, the piece right under the front windshield where the wipers mount. I'm thinking of doing this or a carbon fiber piece from WCC. Please post some pics if you've got either. Thanks!!!

Jason

KARSC5

Y2Kvert4me

Here's mine:

Prosecutor

Here is mine...I don't have a picture of it with the Vette:

jay'szo6

Y2Kvert4me: That looks awesome! Do you have any pics with the hood closed? You had to completely remove that piece, how do you do that? And the wipers too, do they just pop off? Thanks for all the info!

billiardcue

That's funny!

doug doo wop

sorry no pics but I had mine painted mag red along with the wipers and it looks great. The local vet shop that did it said that's the way it should come out of the factory. I didn't think the chrome wipers would look good on mag red (too dark) so I had them painted. I did see a friends black vet with chrome wipers and it DID look good on a dark car.

Y2Kvert4me

Yes, it has to be removed.

It comes off pretty easily. First, remove the wiper arms. To remove the wipers, start by turning the ignition on, flip the wipers to intermiitant, let them sweep once, then shut the ignition off. This leaves the wipers "undocked", and the blades resting on the windshield. Take a piece of tape, and stick it to the windshield at the end of the blade - this makes reinstalling them easy so you get them oriented correctly. Remove the plastic caps and nuts that secure the wiper arm, then rock the arms back and forth on the shaft while pulling up. With enough wiggling, they usually pop off pretty easily. If you find yours are stuck on tight, there is a special wiper arm puller you can find at an auto parts store. Once you have the wipers free, you'll have to slip off the little washer tubes. (self-explanatory).

To remove the cowl, remove the 5 push pins that are in the flat tray of the cowl. Once those are out, slide the cowl towards the engine until the clips under the windshield are clear, then it simply lifts out. You'll have to undo the washer hose fitting that goes through the cowl at this point, it's basically just a grommet that holds in place in the cowl, again, it will be self-explanatory when you get to that part.

Before painting it, you'll want to remove the metal screen that is glued to the backside of the vents, I worked mine off carefully, and it remained intact and held it's shape, so it was easy to reattach. I used a general purpose epoxy to resecure it after it was painted.
Also, there is a rubber edging along the edge of the cowl that seals up to the widshield. You can either totally remove this, or, what I did, was just peel it off the edge, and folded it back over on the underside of the cowl, and masked it. Once painted, I simply folded back around and pressed it back in place along the cowl edge. This part was a little frustrating at first, but start at one edge, and you'll find it sort of snaps into place.

Then reinstall the cowl and wipers, and you're done. Only thing to watch when reassembling is to make sure you get all the tabs under the windshield.


You can see more pics on this thread from a year ago when I did it:

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1088926

Lots of pics with the hood closed on post #45 of that thread.

In reading that, you can tell I wasn't sure if I liked the mod or not...but it didn't take me long to fully appreciate it. I'm so used to it now, it looks like it belongs there, and I'm glad I did it.


Hope that helps.

edensknight

debmwb

Yep...that's how I get mine off too!!!!

Tact

Y2Kvert4me

I guess I deserved that one.

debmwb

Sorry...thanks for letting me play! I really needed that today!

KARSC5

good one