XKRacer and others have posted some fantastic pictures of their work on painted charge coolers. Once I get my new hood liner, so my hood liner no longer abrades my charge coolers, I will like to paint mine or have them professionally done.

-I was wondering what process those who have done this use? Enamel or Powder coating?
-Do you grind the 'Supercharger' lettering to a smooth surface?
-Is the contrasting lettering just carefully painted by brush? smooth roller? or is it masked off and sprayed?

 

There are a couple of ways of doing this.

First you need to remove and clean the charge coolers, the best way to do this is to get them soda blasted, for a couple of small items like this should not cost a lot.
The next step depends on what kind of finish you want, I have actually wet painted mine. After soda blasting I polished the lettering to a mirror finish, etch primed, cleaned off the lettering, painted phoenix red to match my XKR, cleaned of the lettering again, then lacquered over the lot.
This method is not a do and leave idea, I would say it will only last a couple of years before the lacquer starts to 'yellow' with heat, oil, age etc.

Another good method is to have them powder coated in a gloss finish, this is great but the lettering is also painted and the cheapest method is to paint them afterwards with a contrasting color. I have recommended to people in the past to remove the lettering completely, grind it off, and then get some letters laser cut in stainless, but this is not the cheapest solution.

Another solution is to get an aluminium plate engraved with the SUPERCHARGER lettering and have it welded onto the top or fixed another way. If you fix it on you can then have the plate anodised, engraved and the lettering enamalled or chemical filled to anything you want.

There is a large choice/variation you can do. The white charge coolers I did had the lettering painted (very carefully) in black by hand, as this was the theme of the whole car, you can see the car HERE if you want.

I did not paint or fit the kit!

 

I have painted a lot of engines and aluminum accessories. I was the parts with lacquer thinner and then scuff with a scotch brite pad. Then I prime with an etching primer. The urethane etching primer I use has a window, if move to the next step inside the window you don’t have to sand in between. If I wait too long it is just a matter of scuffing again with the scotch brit pad, but I feel it is better to do it within the widow because then you will get a chemical bond that will be stronger, but I have never had either way fail. The next step is to seal with a urethane sealer. I always paint right after sealing instead of waiting over-night, for the same reason as the primer, because of the chemical bond. The difference here is the recoat time on the sealer is only 20 minutes instead of two hours for the primer. Then I top coat with two to three coats of a single stage urethane. I like painting rather than powder coating because the finish is easier to repair if it gets nicked up. I also like using the single stage paint under the hood because it won’t yellow. If I painted two parts black one with single stage and the other with two stage paint you would be hard pressed to see the difference. I use DuPont Chroma One paint for this along with the recommended primers and sealer. I have also used PPG single stage urethanes and the work equally well. I am sure there are other brands but these are the two that I am familiar with. Remember to read the tech sheet, all of the instructions are there. This paint job should last for many years. I think that this would be a great first painting project.