Before anyone says "search" i did.

I bought a used valve cover to paint and replace with my old one and i want to know what i should do before painting i am going to clean it but do i need to prime and sand? its already rough so i wasn't sure. also can i pull off that rubber stuff on the bottom of the valve cover and replace it to get a better seal when i put it on?

 

It is always good to sand (heavy grit) a surface before painting... this will only help everything hold together. I would sand, put on high-temp primer (maybe 2 coats), then 3 coats of whatever color paint you want... but make sure it's high temp paint.

 

i just did it to my cover and heres what i did.
sand the crap outa the cover
sand every nook and crany that you can get to. the more you sand the smoother the paint will lay on itll look like satin.
i used brake caliper paint and i took an entire nite to do it. i must have put about 16 coats on it. then put a high temp clear coat on it too. i did about 5 coats of that
check out my site and youll see the results

 

where did you get high temp clear coat?

 

Any discount auto or NAPA should have some.

 

duplicolor makes one that can handle 500f that is the only one i can find

 

proboy please pm me!!!

 

I have never done this, so I can't say for sure. But in general, it is a good idea to completely remove the old gasket material -- both from the valve cover and from your engine where you take the original one off.

This may require scraping and cleaning with chemicals. Be careful not to scrape the metal or get any of the scraped-off junk into your engine.

Replace the gasket with an OEM one from your Mazda dealer. The price should be under $20, and it should be a perfect fit.

 

i do'nt have to worry about it getting into my engine since i have a valve cover from a junk yard i'm working on, i'm going to put the new gasket on that one after i paint it and put it on my engine, i just wanted to know if it was ok to pull off that gasket an put a new one one cause that one just came off while i was cleaning the valve cover.

There are two metal plates running the length of the valve cover on either side of the inside part of the valve cover can i remove those and clean behind them? or should i not mess withthose parts?