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Interesting DinoBob, I never knew the factory mufflers on an 89 were black. My main motivation for painting them was to stop or slow down the rusting process. That said, it's been a few days since I painted them and I like the way they look. From the side view black mufflers blend in with the black car (as opposed to seeing aluminum/steel mufflers on a black car). I would paint the y-pipe too if I could, but I don't have a way of lifting the car on my own. I agree jv9999, sloppy work on Walker's part selling two mufflers for the same car -- a passenger side with spot welds all over it and a drivers side with no spot welds. I called three different parts suppliers and they all told me the Walker passengers side muffler has spot welds all over it. At that point, I painted the two mufflers I had black and put them on the car. The black paint helps hides the spot welds on the passenger side so it doesn't bother me "as much" and if they perform well I will probably forget about it, but the mystery continues as to why and where they were made like this. Salute.
you can take this FWIW, but here's a pic of the exhaust on an extremely low mileage 90 vert - IIRC, around 5K miles on the clock. note the blackout on the mufflers --
to the best of my knowledge, not the entire muffler was painted black - just what was visible from the rear of the car - ???
edit: just dug up a pic of my steel blue 90's original exhaust (about 36K miles). hard to tell, but it looks like only the rear section of the muffler was painted black.
Quick update: After roughly 6 months the body of the mufflers for the most part have remained black after spray painting them, but some of the paint in the welded joints has peeled off. First time I ever tried painting mufflers and in hindsight I think better prepping, sanding, and removing any oil on the mufflers BEFORE painting them is something I would try to help to avoid this in the future. Hope this helps.
Quick update: After roughly 6 months the body of the mufflers for the most part have remained black after spray painting them, but some of the paint in the welded joints has peeled off. First time I ever tried painting mufflers and in hindsight I think better prepping, sanding, and removing any oil on the mufflers BEFORE painting them is something I would try to help to avoid this in the future. Hope this helps.
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Originally Posted by ~ Daniel
......First time I ever tried painting mufflers and in hindsight I think better prepping, sanding, and removing any oil on the mufflers BEFORE painting them is something I would try to help to avoid this in the future. Hope this helps.
In some cases the best prep isn't enough. Just the resonance alone can cause the paint to flake off. Then add the heat cycling.
Great points fellas, the resonance possibly causing the paint to flake off is an interesting note. If I did it again (knowing the spray paint stayed on the body of the muffler) I would sand the welding joints getting into all the crevices (if possible) on the muffler and rinse with soap and water to get off all the oil, let dry, then add more coats of paint than I did first time, lots and lots of coats on the welding and joint parts............maybe even try a different paint manufacturer....I'm no expert at this lol, but we're tryin' ! PS -- you only notice the flaked off paint if you look under the car. Looking at the car from the back or the side, the mufflers looks black. Hope that helps.
Last edited by ~ Anno Domini; May 10, 2018 at 04:08 PM.
Great points fellas, the resonance possibly causing the paint to flake off is an interesting note. If I did it again (knowing the spray paint stayed on the body of the muffler) I would sand the welding joints getting into all the crevices (if possible) on the muffler and rinse with soap and water to get off all the oil, let dry, then add more coats of paint than I did first time, lots and lots of coats on the welding and joint parts............maybe even try a different paint manufacturer....I'm no expert at this lol, but we're tryin' ! PS -- you only notice the flaked off paint if you look under the car. Looking at the car from the back or the side, the mufflers looks black. Hope that helps.
you could always try a black etching primer. once the surface is clean and prepped, and the acid based paint gets a bite, I would think that in itself would resist flaking -
Quick update 2: After roughly 2½ years most of the black paint that I sprayed on the body off the mufflers has peeled off, except for the 2 pretruding tail pipes on each muffler. They stayed black, which is good because that's what you mainly see looking at the mufflers, but a whole NEW approach of priming and painting the mufflers would be needed to keep the the entire mufflers black. I think some suggestion were made in this thread. Also, the welding on one of the Walker mufflers broke. Thankfully there is a lifetime warranty on it. Right now I'm using wire to keep that muffler attached to the car. It's holding up well until I can get it to the muffler shop. Hope this helps. Thank you.
