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I'm wanting to repaint my head lamp housings on my 68 Cutlass. They are worn and have a couple of water stains otherwise in great shape.
What have you used to freshen up yours?
If your talking about the the plastic headlight surrounds, Krylon 1403 is a perfect match for the plastic headlight surrounds, grills, and taillight trim On the 70-72 models. Should be the same for the early years too but I’m not positive. If you mean the metal highlight buckets I used rustoleum satin black in a rattle can on my 70’s and they turned out really nice.
I have tried many different brands of paint over the years on the headlight surrounds For my 69, unfortunately nothing seems to last very long before flaking off. I can’t recall using the Krylon brand, how well Does it hold up? I need to touch mine up this winter
I used it for the second time about 3 months ago. The first time I used it I had the vehicle parked outside in the weather and it still looked good two years later when I sold it. Also I only painted the grills, not the headlight surrounds and they matched perfectly. They changed the name and the label now says for indoor use only but it’s still 1403 and the color is still the same.
The silver paint seems to hold up pretty well, the black flakes off pretty easy. Last time I painted them I wet sanded all the old stuff off, used some Comet and a scotchbrite pad to scuff the surface, mineral spirits to clean, then laquear thinner to ensure to grease on the surface before painting. This is the current condition after 2 years One of the little projects this winter while the Olds is in hibernation
I would recommend a specific plastic surface prep intended for plastic prior to applying color. Something along the lines of this product by Eastwood will help immensely.
I cleaned them up well and painted the flat black inside first. Then I made cardboard cut outs in the shape of the black areas to mask them off and painted the silver with Krylon Dull Aluminum (which I believe is 1403). 15 years later they are like new.
