1970 Challenger T/A. The exhaust manifolds were redone some time back with a gray coating of some kind. I screwed the finish up on one and need to redo them. Is there a good paint or coating I should use to do this?

http://www.por15.com/FACTORY-MANIFOLD-GRAY_p_51.html

may be this.

BTW, I blasted mine clean and wiped them down with powdered graphite diluted with mineral spirits and it lasted for quite a while.

Or maybe Eastwood's manifold coating:

http://www.eastwood.com/factory-gray-hi-temp-coating.html

It's pretty easy to resurface with a wire wheel/brush and re-coat.

I used the Eastwood's high temp aerosol spray coating on both my cars. I sandblasted the manifolds, wiped them down with acetone and put on 3 light coats as suggested in the directions. It's been about 4 years now and both cars look still look great. There's no sign of fading or rust.

Same as the one in the Eastwood link above? How many cans?

Yes...the spray can. 1 can will be enough for a pair of manifolds. I believe 3 light coats is what they recommend.

I've had good results touching up manifolds on the car with a foam brush. The colors evened up nicely after being heated.

I used the cast gray Bill Hirsch Hi-Temp exhaust manifold paint and was very happy with how they turned out. You can either brush it on or air gun it on, it's thin enough for that. In my case, I brushed it on and it came out nice. Per instructions, I baked them at 400 degrees for an hour, turned out nice. Just pick a time your wife will be away for the day, lol.

I've used VHT Nu-cast high temp spray paint with good results.

Me too. Eastwood high temp gray, Painted on with a brush.

The coating looks very neat but the original manifolds were not gray but were painted with the engine color. The paint burnt off and they should be natural cast iron...which is not gray. I just sand blasted mine and left them natural. Over the last 10 years, there is almost no surface rust but I don't drive it.

Thats why I used the Nu Cast paint. Looks like fresh cast iron metal.

I've used the POR-15 manifold gray with nice results on my son's car.

Mike

eastwoods. I burned the front half of my 72 duster up with the manifolds painted with that stuff. Everything was burnt but after pressure washing it all off they looked like i just had done them while everything else was fried!

corey

There was an article in Mopar Enthusiast where they coated the exhaust manifolds with Slip Plate which is a graphite dry film lubricant. I have never tried it but they said it looked like bare cast iron, protected the manifolds, and was easy to touch up if needed.

I've had really good resulst with the Eastwood stuff. Although I've never used the aerosol.
KID

I have used the Slip Plate on two different sets of manifolds. I like it!

I made my own with dry graphite and mineral spirits. I suggested it but nobody seemed to catch it. It works but it is messy. It looks much better then painted manifolds which I think looks crappy and fake looking. Slip Plate seems to be a better alternative fhough.

I just did the Slip Plate application on my '57 a few weeks ago. It doesn't have much run time yet, but looks good and definitely does not look like paint.

I opted to sandblast the manifolds and use vht high temp cast... Paint works great! As a precautionary measure I heated the manifolds with a torch to "burn" the paint in.. Bolted them to the engine and painted the entire engine so it would have the correct orange burnt look without the rust BS... Came out great!