240 hood badge- A suggestion

[Richard McDonel]

I can't say whether this bright idea of mine has been offered by others before, but here goes:

The metal badge on the front of the hood has a raised centre section and DATSUN letters that are chrome finished.  The recessed areas are painted black.  Over half a century the black paint had faded to pretty much nothing.  I briefly tried to paint the recessed areas, but getting into tiny areas like the interior surface of the "A" was beyond my artistic skill level.  What I came up with was  to take a very thin touch of vaseline on my finger, and run  it over the raised chrome areas, being careful not to get any on the black areas.  Again, a very thin layer on the finger. Then spray paint the badge - three coats in my case - let it thoroughly dry, then wash off the vaseline with soap and water.

It worked!

Attached is the finished product.  I regret not taking before and after pics, but I think any 240 hounds will have a pretty good idea of what it looked like when I started.

[psdenno]

Nice job with your solution.  Another way to do it is to spray the entire emblem and then wipe a pad lightly soaked with paint thinner across the high spots before the paint dries - that's a process I've used in restoring lettering and emblems on vintage metal dealer style license plate frames.

[siteunseen]

Those backside clips are available at Lowe's in their Hillman drawer isle.

I did the vaseline on my horn pad too.

Another good tip thanks to @psdenno is a silver Sharpie for all the silver around the radio and console. I bought mine at Hobby Lobby fyi.

Edited November 9, 2021 by siteunseen

[Richard McDonel]

Siteunseen,

Thanks for the tip on the silver sharpie.  I'll try that.

As  for the hood emblem retaining clips, I had a s.o.b. time getting them off back when I was at the tear-down stage.   Easy getting the nuts off and on with an 8mm socket if I need to ever touch up the emblem. 

Edited November 10, 2021 by Richard McDonel