I am working on sand blasting a bunch of fasteners (nuts, bolts, and washers) for my car. I have the fenders and front end taken apart for some body work. I have been sand blasting the fasteners at work and organizing them in baggies. Now I have a bunch of baggies of bare steel bolts sitting waiting for the next step. I used to spray them with the Rustoleum Primer and leave them until I was ready for paint and then paint all the parts at once. But I wanted to ask around and see what others do. Would you put them in a fixture and give them a good coat of self etching primer? For the people that are very particular, how do you deal with this situation?

After blasting I spray them with Eastwood's Rust Encapsulator.

Bolts are just like the body of the car, PPG Primer and DCC topcoat of body color or black...At least to me...

Don't do the whole chemical process of black oxide in case you are pondering that method. I did my 69's engine bay bolts. I wire wheeled them all, sand blasted them, cleaned them with lacquer thinner, blew them dry and started the chemical process. In 6 months they were rusting. All that work for nothing....Took off whatever I could and sandblasted again...blah blah blah, that whole method and sprayed PPG on em'. 7 years and still good as new.

Just remember to wrap electrical tape around the bolt you are installing so the paint doesnt crack when you go to mount it on.

I just prime them and shoot them with Rusto as soon as I get done with them. That way I don't have to remember where they go as they go right back on the part. Some of the stuff out there will harden up on them and make them impossible to fit, i.e. never POR-15 a bolt or hole as your dimensions will change. The long and short of it is that most of these bolts didn't have anything on them for the past 40 years so any protection at all is a big ++.

I use glass bead and then clean them weth a fine wire wheel. After I clean 20-30 fasteners I soak them in a metal prep then rense/blowdry/etch primer. I coat all natural un-painted fasteners with Boesheild (www theruststore ) to keep them from rusting. I do not like to use sand on any fasteners. If you have heavy rust you can soak them in evaporust overnite and them strip them.

I drill a board with a whole bunch of wholes and put the bolts in the holes and prime them with the same primer i am useing on the car.The nuts and stuff just gets put on a sheet of plywood.
I have also soaked in PPG DX579 then done later since the coating will prevent flash rust

Take an old cardboard box, flip it over, and put a crap load of holes in it with a screwdriver. Stick the bolts in (I like to put them so there is space under the washers) and prime/paint. You can paint nuts etc. on a coathanger hanging so they are horizontal. I use Rust Oleum rusty metal primer, and then Rust Oleum Industrial semi gloss black. Pretty tough, if you give it a few days to dry. I also wrap with tape before putting them in, to keep the damage to a minimun, then after installed I just touch them up.