Aluminum trim on front plastic grills.

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gwittman

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Has anyone ever tried to remove (without damaging) the aluminum trim around the plastic front grills? I have new grills with silver plastic and I would like to paint them black. It seems it would be easier to remove the aluminum trim for painting the plastic rather than trying to mask them. Any tips or suggestions?

Then again if removing the aluminum trim is not that difficult, maybe I can just install it on my old grills because the plastic on it is still in good condition. The aluminum trim is just somewhat pitted.
 
Yes, the anodized aluminum trim can be separated from the plastic grill, but only with great care. On the backside of the grill piece, you should see a whole series of partly crimped sections on the aluminum. Use a medium size flat screwdriver and gently pry out the crimps just enough to separate the mating surfaces. At this point, you should be able to separate the two halves of the aluminum from the plastic piece, but do so with the utmost care as you do not want to break any parts of the grill assembly. If these grills are original and have never been taken apart, then there should be no adhesive used. Take care in not losing the 2 connectors for the aluminum trims as they are not available by themselves.

As for the reinstallation process, the brightworks should snap back into place fairly tightly, but you should a series of hot glue dabs or epoxy along the mating surfaces to hold them together securely. Don't think one should try to crimp these trims back on without damaging them.

As far as painting the plastic grills, you may consider the Krylon plastic paints where not much prepping is needed. Have heard many good things about this particular painting product.

Here are some pics of the disassembled grill pieces.
P1040054.jpg


P1040055.jpg


P1040058.jpg
 
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Hi Bert...

You are clearly the consummate perfectionist!

It's no wonder that both of your vehicles are down at present as likely they
both are on strike and simply refuse to run, drive or start now that they look so darned good!


Cheers@!

Ran
 
jranmann said:
Hi Bert...

You are clearly the consummate perfectionist!

It's no wonder that both of your vehicles are down at present as likely they
both are on strike and simply refuse to run, drive or start now that they look so darned good!


Cheers@!

Ran
Click to expand...

Randy,

Not a perfectionist, but a procrastinator!
 
I did it on some aluminum trim on another one of my older non-BMW cars. It is anodized so I don't know of easy way to do it. You can polish it until the anodize is gone (or strip and polish) to get it to shine but then you don't have the protective anodize.

The best way to do it is to strip the anodize, polish to desired finish then re-anodize with clear anodize.

You could also put a thin clear coating on after polishing but it is not as hard as anodize and may not hold up as well.
 
The lore among the Alfa Romeo community is that Easy Off oven cleaner will remove the anodize used on aluminum windshield surround trim. I have tried it, and it does work - some areas require multiple coats.

With the anodize off, you can polish the soft aluminum. Of course, without re-anodizing, it is vulnerable to oxidation and pitting from road debris. But then too, it is easy to re-polish.
 
Be careful with whatever you use to remove the anodizing. These pieces are very thin and will dissolve if left too long with even the oven cleaner on them.
They also bend quite easily. I’ve done this. It’s not a fun job because they’re delicate. Might try sanding off the anodizing. Like mine they’re probably heavily pitted which has to be sanded out.
 
Some added tips I learned following advice on the E9 Forum. I started with this
https://e9coupe.com/forum/threads/refreshing-headlamp-grills.28812/

Things I learned, improving on process
  • First move the clip as far as you can to one side, then use a plastic trim removal tool, like the one I have pictured
  • Renewing the aluminum trim is allot of work. I stripped with easyoff then got a polisher from Harbor freight. The aluminum is very fragile so be very careful. I destroyed a piece not paying attention and getting it “sucked in” to the polisher. I suggest making a holder, like the one in the attached picture
  • Ceracote alumunm once polished
  • For the plastic, light sanding with fine, no more that 800 grit.
  • Use P&S L450 for the plastic to finish it. IT IS AMAZING I cannot rave about this product enough, the finish actually looked like I spray painted it
 

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Wobdog said:
Some added tips I learned following advice on the E9 Forum. I started with this
https://e9coupe.com/forum/threads/refreshing-headlamp-grills.28812/

Things I learned, improving on process
  • First move the clip as far as you can to one side, then use a plastic trim removal tool, like the one I have pictured
  • Renewing the aluminum trim is allot of work. I stripped with easyoff then got a polisher from Harbor freight. The aluminum is very fragile so be very careful. I destroyed a piece not paying attention and getting it “sucked in” to the polisher. I suggest making a holder, like the one in the attached picture
  • Ceracote alumunm once polished
  • For the plastic, light sanding with fine, no more that 800 grit.
  • Use P&S L450 for the plastic to finish it. IT IS AMAZING I cannot rave about this product enough, the finish actually looked like I spray painted it
Click to expand...
Yes, to all the above and good advice. I too lost a piece to the polisher. Turned it into a piece of spaghetti right quick and also dangerous. I would avoid a polisher on these pieces, but that’s just me. Just keep sending with finer grit up to 3000 or so or more lotta elbow grease but the polisher with these pieces can do some damage, and once they’re bent, they’re hard to get back to the right shape, ask me how I know
Very good advice on the jig
 
Agreed. I have used the oven cleaner on much thicker anodized coated aluminum. And that was a real time saver. But looking at these thin, narrow pieces around the grills....well they looked kinda fragile, and I did not want this to turn into a search for good replacement grills. I just recently refreshed my headlight grills and found that the yellowed, crazed coating could be removed with aggressive grit, I think I went as low as 80, then 180, 220, 320 and so on, and was very pleased with the results. Had to take a couple days off between the repetitive sanding as I started to feel it in my arms. But patience is key, as we have all learned, and sanding and polishing really rejuvenates this part of the car and shows nicely.
 
i was under the impression that the grill trims were anodized aluminum ... surely the aluminum is much thinner than the belt trims, but the finish was the same.
 
I would agree, anodized aluminium. If not anodized, it would never hold it's shine for those 50 odd years.

Otherwise only stainless steel or chrome would be able to keep a shine like that for all those years.

When it comes to polishing, I would definitly start to polish them when mounted on an spare (old and tattered?) black plastic grille. It's the ideal shape and support to work with, easy to grasp, and no risk of a rotary buffing wheel to grip it and 'spaghetti' it.
 
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