Painted my calipers today
Posted: Sun Jul 15, 2007 7:01 pm
Okay, I know a lot of people think it's a bit chav to paint brake calipers, but I think if it's done right it can look really good. The way I see it is that Porsches, Ferraris and so on come from the factory with their calipers painted, so nowt wrong with painting our wee sports cars' calipers too!
I think the standard front calipers look a bit ugly and look really filthy once they get a bit of brake dust on them. Thought black would look good and did the neat little trick of making the raised LOTUS lettering silver. Also painted just inside the circumference of the disks as it was really rusty looking there.
Before:
Calipers done black (this is when I decided I'd definitely do the LOTUS in silver):
After:
With wheel back on:
Personally, I think it looks dramatically better and very cool!
Will do rears at some point during the week.
BTW, if anyone wants to do this and plans on doing the LOTUS lettering like I did, I found a neat trick on SELC*CK: Paint the whole caliper your chosen colour. Then, once that paint is dry, paint the lettering colour onto a little bit of cardboard the size of the letters and press onto the raised letters. Hold for a few seconds, then lift to reveal the letters in your chosen colour! You may need to touch up a little bit with a fine brush.
Also fitted the Eliseparts anti-squeal pad thingies while I had the pads off, so will soon find out if it stops my pagids squealing before they're up to temp.
D
I think the standard front calipers look a bit ugly and look really filthy once they get a bit of brake dust on them. Thought black would look good and did the neat little trick of making the raised LOTUS lettering silver. Also painted just inside the circumference of the disks as it was really rusty looking there.
Before:
Calipers done black (this is when I decided I'd definitely do the LOTUS in silver):
After:
With wheel back on:
Personally, I think it looks dramatically better and very cool!
Will do rears at some point during the week.
BTW, if anyone wants to do this and plans on doing the LOTUS lettering like I did, I found a neat trick on SELC*CK: Paint the whole caliper your chosen colour. Then, once that paint is dry, paint the lettering colour onto a little bit of cardboard the size of the letters and press onto the raised letters. Hold for a few seconds, then lift to reveal the letters in your chosen colour! You may need to touch up a little bit with a fine brush.
Also fitted the Eliseparts anti-squeal pad thingies while I had the pads off, so will soon find out if it stops my pagids squealing before they're up to temp.
D
I don't mind it getting dirty again and covered in brake dust . . . it's the rust that bothered me. Got the idea from SELC*CK. A few folk there have done it and nobody mentioned the paint on the inside of the disk not lasting.