Timing Belt Cover

I finally took the time to paint my timing belt covers. Of course I took had other things to do while I was down there fixing things, but man I'm glad I spent the time to do it. The following is a brief description of how I did it. First you need to remove the timing belt covers. This involves removal of all accesory pulley belts, the removal of the crankshaft pulley, water pump pulley (and fan clutch if you have one [Electric Fan Conversion]), and the idler pulley and crossmember. Once you remove these parts getting to the timing belt covers should be easy. You may also want to remove the metal section of the lower radiator hose and the small peice that attaches to the t-stat...in all cases I suggest you drain the coolant. You may remove the negative battery cable also as this is standard practice.

Once you remove the timing belt covers you can go to work cleaning them off inside and out. Get ALL the grease off. Take advantage of the time that you are using to paint and wait for the paint to dry by jacking up the car, removing the splash guard, and cleaning out all the grease, oil, and dirt you can. This is good for many reasons: looks, cleanliness, and to find out where you may have leaks (coolant/oil). Now you can prep the timing belt covers. I only prepped the outside of the covers...the paint on the inside was still solid and shiny after cleaning it, and you have no need of painting the insides. The PGet some paint stripper (I used spray can paint stripper) and follow the directions on the can to remove the outside layer of paint. You may have to apply and clean the covers several times. Have a "light" metal bristle brush handy to get the loose paint off...even a tooshbrush will help. You want to make sure all the loose paint is off. If there is any paint that is on really tight, you can either continue trying to work it out with stripper, or lightly sand it and use stripper again to get the rest off. Make sure your surfaces are left clean and free of loose paint. Here's what you might see when they are ready. Oh yeah, prep the idler pulley crossmember, too.

These are as prepped as I was willing to get them...they are actually quite ready...the idler pulley crossmember looked a little hashed but its really not bad. I sanded a little rust off of it before continuing. The next step is to give the parts a couple coats of good primer. I just used Rustoleum grey primer. They looked nice just like that, but not near as nice as they would look. Let the primer dry and then you're ready for the color you choose. Go with the classic red or switch it up with blue...or if you want to go all out...go YELLOW!!!

 

 

I used some 500 degree paint from Autozone...Daytona Yellow. It probably isn't necessary to use high heat, but what the heck...why take a chance. I like this paint cause it stays nice and wet looking. Here is a pic without the newspapers and overspray.

Alright!!! Looks pretty good. I painted the idler pulley crossmember black to give a good constrast for the idler pulley. While I was doing the timing covers I replaced the water pump, the alternator, the water pump pulley, and the crankshaft pulley. The reason why can be found here: Putting a Maxima alternator in your Z31. I am very pleased with the way the timing covers turned out. I do plan to do the valve covers yellow, but that'll have to wait until I get a 240SX throttle body. I don't want to remove all that crap until I can do everything at once. I have already done it once to clean up, and it was done a second time when the head gaskets were replaced. So just hold on and enjoy the look it has now until I get those cam covers (valve covers) done. Here's a final pic of the engine bay...also notice the shine of the new alt. and the Underdrivepulley. It just looks nice. I also found out during the course of this work that the metal coolant pipe (lower rad. hose assembly) is stainless steel...sure didn't look like it before. I took some light sand paper to it and it the stainless steel came shining through. A good pic of that is on the right.