not bad pics for a camera phone

 

Thank you, they were from my new Samsung A-900 (aka the blade). I was pleasantly surprised when I uploaded them myself. Night and day compared to my old nextel that died on me last weekend.

Edit: only the last few posts have been from the camera phone. The first post pics are all from my Sony 4.1 megapixel. As soon as I get the lower grill and SS badges I ordered from GM, I will use my girls really nice Sony to snap some better shots.

 

how easy was the front bowtie to take off? , it looks like it is bolted on.

 

^^Extremely easy man, I just used a socket (10mm IIRC) in my hand. They are the same style of nuts gm used to hold the taillights in a cavalier. If you were ever a j-body owner.

At any rate the emblem has two bolts attached to it and is held on by two of those nuts behind your grill. Just grab a deep socket and twist them off by hand. I will verify the socket size if I get a chance, unless someone else can off the top of their heads.

If you cant get them off with hand strength, you can pop the pins/clips that retain that front section of grill/bumper/rad shroud and then pull it up over the hood bump stops for more clearance to get a ratchet down there.

You can see where the retaining clips were pulled in mine, I only did this because I had to remove the headlights, but it also allows for better access to the grill and emblem.



I re-installed the emblem just by hand tightening, so a ratchet is not necessary to tighten this style of nut either. Hope that helps.

 

I like, you did a good job.

 

it has two 10mm nuts holding it on. Be careful. Cause they are plastic nuts. They themselves arent plastic, but, they are designed to be used on plastic things. The emblem has 2 plastic pegs on the back side, and the nuts actually cut into the pegs. So, if you tighten them to tight or take the nut off at an angle the pegs will break. Just use a socket and your hand, dont use a ratchet or wrench. They shouldnt be on to tight any way.

 

Thank you

MadFish Thanks for confirming that they were 10mm I wasn't 100%. Same size as the ones that hold the headlights in.

 

I love the car. It looks awesome. Are you in town this weekend? I would like to see it in person, I live in East Lansing.

 

Yeah I should be around all weekend, not sure about Monday yet though.

I live north of Old Town

 

Alright cool, I'll be out driving around and hopefully tuning some more today. Maybe I'll see you out!!!

 

If you haven't dealt with them before crateenginedepot.com is awesome. I ordered some parts at the end of the day Friday, right before Memorial Day Weekend, and they were waiting for me when I got home today , I was a little stoked.




I love the lower grill, but I'm undecided on the emblem.





And incase anyone was wondering I park in my lawn because the trees over my driveway trash my car nightly if I leave it there, lol. It turns out I like my Cobalt better than my lawn.

 

Looks great dude. i also think u shoulda painted the bracket by the caliper as well, but it still looks sick. i have an orange ss too, but i am going to paint my headlights orange to match the body color. what other colors is the brake caliper painting kits offered in? im not really feelin the red brakes on an orange car... i do however like the bowtie. One more question, what method of seperating your headlight did u use? because, personally, i am a bit skeptical about baking my headlamps in a damn oven, lol. well, try to reply, and good job again.

 

I would have painted the entire caliper myself

I also think that front end looks better with the SS badge on there

those black in those headlights come off pretty strong, thats not flat black is it? Now you most definitely need some type of dark wheels and dark theme going on with those headlights.

 

i was thinking about the same thing....maybe you shoulda spent another 15 bucks and got jackstands while you were at it

 

ok,i have a few more questions about this headlight painting, just so i dont **** it up, cuz knowing my luck, i will somehow... ok, here it goes. ANY ANSWERS WILL BE GREATLY APPRECIATED. 1.) What do u use to seal the headlights back up? and is it difficult? 2.) Is there any issue with adjusting or aiming the headlights when u r done? and 3.) Did u get all the old sealant off before resealing it with the new stuff, whatever it may be that you used? plase guys, help me out here, i really dont wanna screw this car up, Its too beautiful to deserve that. lol

 

Once again,,, look closer, the car IS on jack stands and I wouldn't trust a $15 stand myself, but whatever floats ya man.



I've been working on cars since I was knee high, the rims are just placed under the car incase my jack stands fail. I love my rims, and take excellent care of them, but like I said earlier if a stand fails, (my driveway is on an angle) I'd much rather have the car fall on a rim than on my leg. Sorry if I come off as a bit of a dick there, but I've been asked this 3-4 times now already, lol. /end rant

I could only find the caliper painting kits in red, blue, and yellow. But I've been told you can use high temp aerosol and it works just as well, and gives you a ton more options for color. But unless you are awesome with spray paint and masking, I'd suggest removing the calipers from the rotors at least, if not completely from the vehicle to do it this way. Otherwise you'd have alot of masking to do. Whenever I upgrade my rotors I will probably do mine this way in either orange if I can match it, or black.


For the headlights, I prefer the oven method. I have done several cars this way and never had a problem. For the Cobalt I tried the hair dryer method described in the how-to on this site, but it puts too much heat in an isolated area and can warp things. My rectangular reflector on the driver side warped due to this and cracked when I tried reshaping it, so I had to silicone it back in place

In short, set the oven to 200 degrees and toss em in for about ten minutes,,, much better IMHO.

As for the old sealant it is kind of up to you, the cobalt uses a slilghtly different sealant than most headlights I've worked with. When I did my cavalier and all the other cars I removed as much of the sealant as possible. But the cobalt sealant is very heat dependent (it's a thermoplastic polymer if you know your O. Chem), above ~150 degrees it becomes very soft, but it is extremely hard at room temp.

The point is no sealant you can find is as good as the stock stuff. Some may argue this too, but if you have taken a cobalt headlight apart you know what I am saying. It makes no sense to remove a high quality engineered sealant and replace with some cheap RTV auto-zone stuff. So I left almost all of it on, (unless you make a mess in disassembly and get the stuff where it shouldn't be) and just preheated the halves separately and then re-assembled while the sealant was still soft enough to work with. It is a good idea to get some clear RTV sealant to seal up any area you aren't confident about afterwards.

Aiming the lights should not be an issue unless you used the hair dryer (or oven at too high a temp) and warped some of the components.

Personally I don't feel this task is difficult at all. Plan on a pretty full day just because of all the time the sanding/primer/sanding/paint/sanding etc etc. You get the idea. But really the only tools you will need are, 10mm socket, a couple of knives to pry apart the assembly, and a heat source. Then all your painting goodies.

Feel free to ask any questions about these I have done quite a few of them now.

And also some people may argue on this, but don't worry if you break a tab or two or hell even all of them while taking the headlights apart. Just take your time and make sure not to crack the lens or break part of the housing. As long as you do a good job of re-assembly you should be okay without the little tabs

 

k thanx alot man. i think im gonna go take the headlights off my old civic and do it once on them just to gain a little bit of confidence. i baby my cobalt and since im not too experienced in this headlight painting, i think ill donate my honda to science lol. but yea, thatnx alot, you've been a big help.

 

Thats actually a good idea man. I've never done em on a civic, but it should be similar.

Best of Luck

 

ok, last question i promise, lol. how long do i have to wait for my paint to dry before i put both halves back in the oven to seal it back up?

 

Just to be safe , I would let it dry overnite before putting them back together . If the paint is not fully cured , youll have a surprise within a week or 2 . The chemical reaction of the paint drying will cause the inside of the clear lens will start to etch which looks like its fogging up a lil from the inside . Some qwik drying spray paints will fully dry qwik enuff u wont need to worry bout it . I used Duplicolor Engine paint , and waited about 12 hours . Mine didnt etch at all .

 

Well, i just got finished with the project, too bad i wasnt on in time to hear that i should leave them overnight. lol. oh well, heres some pics of how the civic turned out. thanx for everything, from everyone. TELL ME WHAT YOU GUYS THINK!!!



Thanx again everybody! I think they are gonna look great on the Cobalt!!

 

Yeah it would have been best to leave them overnight before placing them back in the oven.

The cool thing about the cobalt headlights though is that you never have to put the painted bezel back into the oven. Unless you ever need to take them apart again.

The bezel should still be allowed to dry for a decent amount of time, but when re-assembling the Cobalt headlight you will have three pieces; the lens, the housing, and the painted bezel.


Depending on how much of the old sealant you scrape off you could only have to put the housing itself back in (to soften the sealant) But when I did mine the edges of the lenses were still coated, so i put them back in as well.

Either way once the individual parts have been at temp for long enough to soften the sealant, just pop them out of the oven (Wear gloves for this one, lol) Then you can drop the bezel in and begin re-assembly. You should be able to get it all back together with hand pressure. Then just keep working it around as the sealant cools and within a few minutes it should be good to go. Here's where you can use some RTV sealant to patch up any areas that you may be concerned about. But if you left most of the old sealant in tact you should be solid.

 

Looks good man