This thread (click here) prompted me to do something about my practically black exhaust tips. I had attempted to clean them with various types of solvents and even some mild acids to no avail. I would always get clean dimples, but the soot would never come off of the 'valleys' in the casting. Well, yesterday afternoon I went out there with my dremel, some sanding and grinding bits and some sand paper. I'm going to get rained out today, so no more work can be done until atleast tomorrow. I plan on doing some more smoothing before I lay down some paint to protect the finish.

So here'* the before and mid step 1 photos:



Now since I already have my grill painted silver and am planning on painting my calipers silver, I was thinking of just smoothing out the exhaust tips and painting them silver as well. If I could remove them, I would polish them up, but since they are welded on, that is out of the question. I wanted to paint them because they would match up then with my grills and, sooner or later, my calipers

So here'* my question... After a 100 mile drive last night, the tips were not hot to the touch. I was actually able to hold my entire hand on the tip without discomfort. To me that would be enough to say that a regular paint would be fine to use, but I thought I'd ask. Do you guys think that I would need high temp paint to keep the paint from discoloring?

Let me know and there will be more pics to follow as this little project continues.

nice pics and nice job on da tips looks like everything went well

Well, they're a long way from finished right now. It just started to sprits outside so I'm just going to make a run to Home Depot and see what I can find for some emry cloth tapered bits for my dremel to do some more smoothing. I've got my straight emry cloth rolls for my dremel, but I always wear out the leading edge and have to flip them over to get it all to wear out. a tapered emry roll would work great. I'm also going to pick up some fine emry cloth to do the 2nd to last clean up before paint. The last will probably be a 500 grit sand paper.

well its lookin good so far

looks good, but they'll be black again in no time

That'* kinda like saying "Why clean your rims when they'll just get black again." Pessimism never gets anyone anywhere!

When I got back home this morning I desided to test the temp of the tips with my engine still on and, although I could hold my hand on the tips, it was considerably hotter than it was last night. Now I am thinking that a high temp paint is necessary to keep the tips from discoloring or burning the paint off. If I can get them cleaned up and smoothed out properly, I'll just get a high temp clear coat and spray them down. That'll keep the nice look at make them much easier to clean.

Oh and the point of doing this is not only to make them look good, but to also make them easier to clean.