ok, I'm not sure what the correct name is of the bar that holds the hood up. Anyway, I want to paint it to match the rest of the mods I've done under the hood. Do I just sand it down good and paint it? Do I need a high temp paint or will anything do? thanks for the help.

 

I am pretty sure that any paint will do the job.......you might want to prime it first though......

 

boy that was quick. Thanks, I'll try that.

 

after you sand it down, use something that's alcohol based and clean the part you want to paint.....so the paint sticks.

 

and just so you know....its called a HOOD PROP ROD.

 

Though you could probably use any paint, I would recommend the high temp paint. I painted the hood prop in my eclipse with regular paint and it faded really fast.

 

I tried doing this, and it took a long time to get satisfactory results.

First, I tried just painting it with high temp paint. That worked fine, except for two parts: the tip, where it hooks into the hood, and the place where the clip holds it down. The paint kept chipping off those two spots.

I tried just putting some electrical tape on those spots, but that too came off.

Somebody suggested using that rubber paint that is used for dipping tool handles in. I gave it a try, and it seemed pretty cool, but eventually that came off as well.

Finally, I found some heat-shrink tubing. It is a rubber tubing that shrinks when you heat it up. You find it in the electrical aisle of the hardware store, because it is intended for insulating bare wires.

Anyway, you get a size bigger than what you want to wrap. I think I used 3/8" tubing. Then you heat it up and it shrinks to half its diameter. I used the burner on my stove, set to high. Don't try to shrink it too much, or it will tear.

First, I removed the prop rod from the car, which is easy to do. If you look at the hinged end, you can see that you just need to open up the hinge and slide it out.

Then I got my heat shrink tubing, and I slipped the rubber over the business end of my rod

I held it over the stove burner to shrink it down. Then I trimmed off the excess at the end.

Now I have a length of rubber insulation that covers the four inches at the end of my hood prop rod, and it has been very resistant to chipping and tearing in the clip or in the hood hole.

 

So all you did was heat shrink the tip, and leave the rest painted?