I am in the process of painting my NATO hitch, and in the quest to get a nice durable finish I suddenly though about baking it to get the paint nice and hard. We used to do something similar with model boats. So am thinking - if I whack it in the oven for a bit - what temperature should it be (not too hot presumably) and for how long? Don't want SWMBO getting too upset!

Any ideas?

Cheers

James

I don't think normal paint would like bveing in an oven - you would have to use a heat-proof paint, such as Sperex or possibly engine enamel. I stripped mine and painted it with yellow engine enamel and it came out fine. Best not let Walfy read this - he doesn't approve of NATO hooks being painted.


Les

Painting recovery pintles . Mutter mutter grumble. Shhh say nothing, mind the blood pressure. Walk away from it now before it upsets you.

It wouldn't be very hot at all - more of warm! Much along the lines of if you have a car resprayed, the good places will stick it in the warm 'oven' or whatever you want to call it to finish off. Will probably just leave it by a radiator for a while.

I understand what you mean walfy, but previous owner had soaked it in petrol and set light to it apparently to remove all the old paint/whatever. Which means it nows rusts quite badly in places. Hence the painting.

just a suggestion, why dont you strip it off paint, get it to a nice rust free grey casting (or forging, whatever it is) and then oil it once in a while? The paint is bound to get damaged anyway, no matter what you do to it!

muzaz, because in the UK it cold, wet and in the winter, salty ! It'd have a life expectancy of 2 weeks

Mo

I painted my tow hitches but only because people didn't see then and would bang their knees on them when trying to cross the road. I painted the 30ton hitch on the back on my 6x6 bright pink to make it more visible as cars parking behind would do it by feel and leave big gouges in their bonnets. Didn't make any difference, nor did painting it yellow on black so I figured car drivers just liked bumping it.

/serious mode/

Why not paint them Mark? they come "primed" as such, from the manufacturers don't they?

is it because the paint could hide a crack or something? or does the paint (somehow?) weaken the metal??

confused of Swindon.

When my XD was rebuilt the NATO tow hitch was stripped, re-primered with the red oxide coloured stuff and repainted in nice gloss black
Two years on, I've not towed a thing but have doused the tow hitch in WD40 before the wet/winter seasons started and the red undercoat is starting to show through.
Painting the tow hitch is solely cosmetic, it does look good when new, but the paint will eventually wear away with a little surface rust showing through irrespective of whether you tow with it or not. I don't see the paint doing any harm, they look great when all glossy, but those NATO hitches are cast from hard as hell materials and they certainly wont erdoe away

Forgot about that in my part of the world its dry and warm, we dont need to paint anything as metal just refuses to rust!!!

chris

Yes correct Jim. Paint hides all sorts of defects. Hence same with all metal recovery gear, shackles etc. And why you can't but painted ladders anymore as well.

why not get it back to bare metal and either use just that red oxide/red lead stuff or just clear laquer it will help protect it and the other paint drys well on metal

dave

Or you could have one BZP'd?


it's on on eBay... Item number: 250233456461 in case anyone is interested

just recoat it in red lead primer if you can find any, mines only got it's primer coat on & still looks pretty good.

i still need to get one before i can paint it lol