My engine has been rebuilt and the original alum valve covers have been reinstalled. They were blasted with the cast paint. I don't think they look that great. It looks as if there has been a repair to one of them but its on the side and not visable.

Is there a better treatment or is this the best it gets? I have seen a few book with new aftermarket covers. Is this a solution?

Thanks. John

 

You could get them blasted with glass beads (glass-beading), or reskinned

 

these are the covers off my '65. I glass beaded them at LOW pressure.
A lot of guys will tell you not to glass bead them but I found at low pressure they come out looking great.
I had the opportunity to side-by-side compare them to a another set that had just been "reskinned" which is the other recommended process and found they looked 100% the same. I both sets for a good 10 minutes trying hard to find any differences and could not find even the slightest difference between the two sets.

 

What involved with the term re-skinded. Does that mean re-dip. By the way the covers look great, thats what i'm trying to achieve.

 

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...ghlight=reskin

But sounds like low pressure bead-blasting is all you need.

 

most people that offer "reskinning" won't give away their process as they say it's proprietary but from my understanding it's basically a tumbling process.
one of the more popular guys to send covers to for reskinning is here:
http://www.z28camaro.com/restosvcs.html

 

if you go with glass beading the key word here is LOW pressure. If I recall correctly I did mine at around 12-15psi. just enough to clean them us and give them a uniform finish but without affecting the surface of the aluminum.
Depending on the condition of your covers I'd probably start at 8 or 10psi and increase it only if you need to to clean them up. keep the pressure as low as possible that will get the job done.

also, if you happen to have other parts that need glass beading do them first. When I did mine the glass beads were fairly well used at that point and the more used the beads are the less abrasive they are since the sharp edges have been worn down. This can also help with cleaning the covers without affecting the finish of the aluminum.

 

Thanks Jeff, I read some of the old posts.

I think i'll give the bead-blasting a try. We have a old sears sandblaster around here someplace. Would this do the trick.
Some thread mentioned to set the PSI around 65.

 

See Barry's post about PSI. And make sure you aren't using Sand in that sand blaster

 

I haven't done this....yet, but I've been told that Soda Blasting works very well on valve covers or aluminum intake.

I believe you'll achieve same results as BarryK got with LOW pressure Bead Blast but you don't need to worry about 'pressure' as much with Soda Blast.

 

This reskining thing is an interesting "Trade Secret" At the Knoxville Vette Show I asked a vendor who advertised "Reskinning" if it was some sort of chemical etch process. It was just a casual off handed question. The guy got all bent out of shape, I mean to say he was clearly and outwardly abrasive (no pun intended) after I asked the question. Cannot recall who he was but he was from California. He left me feeling that if he was the only guy on the face of the earth who could reskin an aluminum manifold I would not do business with him.

Nobody who does this will talk about WHAT it is. You would think it is some kind of Medeval Alchemy the way they shuffel shoe around any questions about how it is done, I think it is just a high priced low pressure blast as indicated above OR possibly some sort of tumbling process in a rotating drum filled with media of some sort though I am not sure if that kind of process can be used on a finished part. Tumbling might be too rough for the little ears and what not even if the drum were totally filled with media and the manifold totally burried in the media. Perhaps the manifold is somehow secured and the media is moved PAST the surface of the manifold, not unlike a blasting. Processes like tumbling are used on metal parts I know that but something as large as a manifold ...I don't know if that can be done W/O securing the work piece and moving the media. Whatever it is it looks good but the prices and the "If I tell ya I gotta kill ya slowly and painfully" attitude of these guys tells me something is not legit. That something is the PRICE in case ya don't get my drift.

 

I had mine bead-blasted at low pressure also, and they came out great; simply easy solution.

dave

 

Saw an episode of Trucks, I think, where they submerged ceramic-coated exhaust pipes into a soapy vat of little beads and the whole thing vibrated enough that the little beads served to polish the exhaust pipe.

My theory is that reskinning is that, with different media.

 

Again, low presure bead blasting. Mine were really stained/painted and they look like a million bucks. I used 15lbs of pressure. Be patient, it took me well over an hour for 2.

 

Use very low pressure and a very fine aluminum oxide media, wipe down with wax & grease remover and coat with high temp, satin clearcoat to minimize oxidation.
Dave

Here is a photo of the valve covers that were done as described above.

 

I'm in the same camp, Bead Blast with Glass Beads, and low pressure and large nozzle. If you do not have a glass bead blasting cabinet, you could check with any machine shop, they usually have one. Tell them to use LOW pressure, and go just far enough to get a uniform surface.

Then finish with 0000 (Very Fine) steel wool. They will look like new.
The steel wool process takes a few hours to get it all the nooks and crannies.

Mark

 

I think this is the dead on response.

I have been trying to figure out what exactly "reskinning" involves for several years now. Reskinning is an attempt to reproduce the factory process for cleaning sand cast parts.

From what I have read, a part is placed in a vibratory device that contains a slurry of media, and the part is gently cleaned of any oxidation, etc. Other accounts have mentioned tumbling as well, but I agree that this could potentially harm some pieces. Beyond that, I do not know. I elected to go with the blasting under very light pressure and my parts look pretty good. They have not been judged but they look good to me and I have looked at a lot of valve covers and manifolds for this comparison.

Joel

 

Below is a picture of my alternator (before and after) I had done locally at a repair shop, he use's a tumbler with steel shot, if you look at the intake which I had reskinned by Jerry MacNeash they look the same. Jerry does a great job and I would use him again if I needed repair work done, but for small parts I will take them to this alternator repair shop. They have done my other ones and they look like new out of the Box.


http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/k...0450Medium.jpg
http://i282.photobucket.com/albums/k...2291Medium.jpg

 

Can someone advise what they had to pay to have the valve covers beaded/blasted? They look great and mine don't. Thanks.

Rob