Seeking advise on engine bay restoration

[Thomas76]

My car exterior was painted before I purchased it, but they did not do the engine bay. With the engine out this winter for a swap I thought it would be perfect time to address the eye sore.

Question is what color/sheen to paint it.
Exterior is base/clear metallic Polaris.
I was thinking of color matching in catalytic single stage low gloss, but maybe skip the metal flake.
Thoughts?

 

[Stevehose]

Here's my Polaris engine thread:

Engine rebuild and engine bay resto thread - 2240284 '72 CS

I'm starting a thread documenting my engine rebuild after sucking a piece of metal down carb throat #2 and the mayhem inside the cylinder that ensued. I'll start with the pics of the head and piston damage as posted in the prior thread which documents finding what happened to cause the...

e9coupe.com

It's easy to get matching paint/clear which I recommend for looks and ease of cleaning. The paint I used has the smallest flake I could find and matched my exterior in terms of that very well. I hate large flake.

A tedious yet rewarding endeavor.

 

[dang]

I'd paint it the same as the exterior.

 

[sfdon]

We do this job every year.

Intense degrease, scrub each inch. Scrub each inch 5 times…
Caution with cleaners on fenders.
treat rust areas, sand and prep. Do it twice.
primer
sand
primer
paint
clear coat

 

[sfdon]

 

[Thomas76]

We do this job every year.

Intense degrease, scrub each inch. Scrub each inch 5 times…
Caution with cleaners on fenders.
treat rust areas, sand and prep. Do it twice.
primer
sand
primer
paint
clear coatView attachment 195939View attachment 195940View attachment 195941

I very much underestimated the amounts of "nooks and crannies" in our engine bays! Nothing is flat for very long.