Stencil success (kinda)

I hate to introduce something trivial in light of the the Bad Car Guy discussion, but heck .. why enter the Labor Day with our shorts in a bunch? So here is something completely different (but far less juicy). A few weeks ago I inquired about stenciling the airbox on my 328 and got some good comments on both what it looked like and how to do it. The 328 only says Ferrari .. no filter logo. I purchased one of those 2-piece stencils on e-bay ($25) and today I did the deed. Here are my observations,

1. Cut the stencil to a fairly small size .. enough margin for masking tape. The e-bay stencil was for 308's so I trimmed off the filter logo end.

2. Mask off the engine compartment as there is a lot of white paint dust generated. I imagine an air brush would work better than a spray can. Clean the airbox surface to remove any dirt and grease.

3. I bought this stuff called "Tacky Glue" made by Aleen (www.duncancrafts.com). You spray this on the stencil, let it dry and it leaves a tacky surface .. used for crafts, photographs .. anything you'd like to place and then remove cleanly. After positioning the uncoated stencil and making reference marks as to its location, I coated the back side.

4. Place the tacky glued stencil (the first of two, the one with the most amount of the logo) in position and tap on the surface to seat it.

5. Use 3M blue painters tape and seal aroung the edges of the stencil.

6. Spray paint with white high temperature paint and do it lightly. Make about 5 or 6 passes allowing it to dry between passes. Do not get the nozzle too close to the stencil. Unfortunately keeping it at a distance also makes for a lot of white overspray dust so short bursts are best.

7. After the last coat has dried, remove stencil #1. I used a hair drier to cure the paint before proceeding to stencil #2.

8. #2 is easy to position by matching up with #1's painted results. Do the same thing as #1 with the tacky glue and paint.

So was it perfect? Not exactly. It is a bit fuzzy in a couple of spots but I was able to touch it up with matte black paint and a very small brush. Certainy not factory perfect .. and probably not $115 perfect (or whatever they charge for doing it out there in FerrariLand). But is it good enough to display at the local FCA get together? Absolutely.

Have a great Labor Day behind the wheel.

Robert