Keith Black Engineering 426 Hemi-Engine Color

[69NovaYenko]

Looking to replicate a late 60ties Keith Black Engineering 426 Hemi race engine. While look at reference pictures it suddenly suck me that in a number of the reference photos the engines were not painted in the traditional Mopar engine orange. Further reading indicated the blocks were special cast aluminum. What would be the best paint color for block, heads and oil pan...silver, aluminum with a over coat of dull coat or some other color. Open to suggestions.

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Edited November 9, 2015 by 69NovaYenko

[Muncie]

my favorite paint for cast aluminum was Krylon Dull Aluminum.  It even dried to a cast like surface - Alas, went looking for some last week and couldn't find it in the stores...  Not sure if their other metallic paints come close - Sorry, I know tha'ts no help - I'm starting a new search for a solution

Something about the dates has me wondering - seems like the aluminum blocks didn't come out until the early 70's.  Prior to that KB engines would have been Mopar iron blocks.

trivia - the first 25 KB blocks were cast with the letters Chrysler above the oil pan rail - Mother Mopar said no no no and pointed out that the 426 was never installed in a Chrysler - 426 hemi's were only Dodge or Plymouth.

[Cato]

Your reference photos are great;  go with that. Use a Testors Metallizer silver and leave it dull with just a rub on the edges.

I was MD at World in 2006 when we cast the Hemi for CC. The iron blocks all got painted Hemi orange. I shot the first one for the initial full-page ads in Hot Rod and all perf. magazines. The ally blocks were raw but the molds were beautiful and the blocks and heads had a natural sheen to them - not a shine. The casting was very dense. The cut decks looked like chrome. Of course on the dyno, they dulled a little bit.

[69NovaYenko]

 

Muncie

After reading your comment I decided to look into when Keith Black started casting aluminum 426 Hemi blocks. This is what I uncovered:

"Keith moved the operation to its current location in South Gate, allowing expansion of the machine-shop and a more suitable area for stocking parts. He introduced his aluminum version of Chrysler's 426 Hemi in 1974. This was the fuel category's "bread-and-butter" engine for the better part of the next decade."

http://www.keithblack.com/history.html

 

Edited November 10, 2015 by 69NovaYenko

[Muncie]

great reference pictures - seldom get to see the block like that outside of a car

thank you for researching the date - it's good to have it defined, sorry I left it so fuzzy.  If you are building late 60's, early 70's, most of the fuel racers left the iron block bare - didn't have to mess with hot tanking the block to remove the paint when it had to go back to the machine shop for repair work.  Hot tanking damages the cam bearings so the unpainted block saved removing and installing new cam bearings - critical to minimize machine shop time and expense between races for most weekend warriors

OK, back to the original paint question...

 

[Force]

If you are going to build a period correct dragster from the 60's the engine block would be cast iron, some racers did paint them but the cast iron engine blocks were short lived in the Nitro cars as they couldn't be that easily repaired if you threw out a rod, and many didn't bother to paint the blocks...so what color you choose or if you leave it bare is up to you.
Aluminum Hemi's for Nitro racing didn't come until the early 70's, Keith Black did his 426 based version in 1974 as Greg stated and Donovan did their 392 based 417 in 1971...before that they used stock cast iron blocks as stated.
The aluminum engines are bare and I would maybe use an aluminum metalizer paint of some kind, or one of Alclad 2's aluminum finishes, their website http://alclad2.com/

Edited November 10, 2015 by Force