Respraying an intercooler

[FD3S Efini]

I have a panspeed intercooler and the panspeed writing is starting to become very faint how would i go about spraying it again? would it be ok to give the intercooler a light spray of silver to get rid of the current panspeed logo and the spray on a new one?
 
will this in anyway affect the intercooler itself?
 
Kris

[fil_auto]

Kris - pretty sure with a v light coat it\'ll be fine!
Quite interesting you posted this actually as I\'ll b doing the v same with my Apexi GT!

Mine has a little black overspray which I\'d like to get rid of, so am gonna but a rattle can of silver me thinks....

input from others welcome.....

[FD3S Efini]

cheers dude sounds good to me but am open to hear from other people aswell
 
Kris

[Aubec]

I\'d be more inclined to clean the old paint off then spray a new logo than to apply two more coats of paint...  The more layers of paint you put on there the less efficient you are going to make the thing - paint will not just coat the front surface, it\'ll be running down between the fins etc. reducing air flow - the black you can probably spray on pretty light, but the silver to cover the old paint first will probably have to be pretty thick to actually successfully cover the old black.

[Jono FD3]

how are you thinking of removing the black as from experiance, the cooler fins are aloy & bend very very easily, so you can\'t get in there with any abrasive material!
Jono

[fil_auto]

Good points raised chaps and appreciate the input / advice....

Will look closer and see what can be done before trying to cover with a little paint..... it is minimal and tbh prob unnecessary....... am just being pedantic! :p :Thumbs-up

[FD3S Efini]

hmmm i never thought about the thickness of the paint as jono is right i cant just scrub it off with a wire brush because it will damage the IC...awnsers on a stamped address evelope lol
 
is there any other way to remove the current logo?
 
Kris

[Aubec]

They strip car bodies for painting with acid, so same principle must apply here?  Some kind of nasty haz-chem bath is in order?  Probably something you can buy from halfords?

[12at]

matt black ftw
 
From this:
 


 
 
To this:
 

[Lil-Steve]

I think it\'s a bad, bad idea to go spraying paint on an intercooler or any other type of radiator (unless it\'s in your house as the misus would go spare).
 
The intercooler at the end of the day is a heat exchager built from metal (aluminium I should think in this case) as it has a very high heat conductivity (changes temperature very rapidly to match local conditions) to spray it with plastic (paint) defeats the object of the heat exchanger. Plastics have a very low conductivity, a polystyrene cup is a good example of this. You want the intercooler to cool rapidly as you pass cool air over it you are effectively applying a thermal barrier preventing this from happening.
 
Now yes the paint layer my be thin minimising this effect but if you spent the money to buy yourself a fancy intercooler why kill a percentage of it\'s good work. So YES put the logo on, NO dont cover it in silver paint.

[m1tch]

Thats an UBER silly idea to spray the intercooler with paint, like lil-steve said it needs to be metal to air contact, the paint just insulates it, it might be ok with a bit for a logo as there is still a lot of active area so it should be ok.

Why did you spray the intercooler black? black absorbs heat, so not only does that intercooler not work well, but it also absorbs heat....its now an interwarmer so matt black FTL.

[gazzgazz]

Standard Skyline GTR intercoolers are black and they appear to work well

i also painted the silver intercooler on my celica black, made no diff what so ever to the intake temps.
I used black radiator paint from Halfrauds..

[iaint]

May or may not make a diff to efficiency but, to clean it I\'d reccomend using a soft toothbrush an appropriate chemical paint remover.  Shouldn\'t bend the fins then.

[karl_tate]

nitromorse the paint off, and just spray the logo on again :yes

[McC]

It mite be a more expensive option and i dont know how it could be done to bring out lettering but if i was to even think about changing the appearance of my IC i would look at anodizing instead of painting it!