Fender vent badge rubber gasket replacement

[Skier167]

Everything on the fender vent is plastic welded. I used a small drill bit to just break to the of the weld off on the other pieces. I’m not painting my f150 logo on it. You can pry the whole fender vent off or can get at it from inside the hood after you remove sound deadening insulation. I went that route and popped the clips off from the inside

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[Flash69]

I painted everything except the Platinum lettering itself. Wanted to keep something original on the fender vents. LOL

 

[Graygoose2021]

I painted everything except the Platinum lettering itself. Wanted to keep something original on the fender vents. LOL

dang good job!!

 

[Skier167]

I painted everything except the Platinum lettering itself. Wanted to keep something original on the fender vents. LOL

Wow that looks really good. I’m leaving the f150 and platinum in the chrome for now since the grille and tailgate appliqué are chrome. Also have the small strip on the door that’s still chrome but hopefully this summer I’ll pull it and paint it black. I ended up having to get my painted professionally cause the smoked quartz didn’t look right out of a rattle can Below was my attempt at it

 

[jhelrey]

Don't hesitate to wrap stuff in gloss black. I dechromed my truck and being how dark the color is, it turned out great.

 

[Flash69]

Wow that looks really good. I’m leaving the f150 and platinum in the chrome for now since the grille and tailgate appliqué are chrome. Also have the small strip on the door that’s still chrome but hopefully this summer I’ll pull it and paint it black. I ended up having to get my painted professionally cause the smoked quartz didn’t look right out of a rattle can Below was my attempt at it

I completely understand, had similar problems. Mine was not matching well either so I repainted one of the vents 5 or 6 times. Stripped it down to chrome each time and started over. Rapid Red is a tri-coat paint which seems to be harder to match. I had my exhaust cutout rear bumper parts painted by a pro and they didn’t match. He had to repaint them again using my gas cover as the source to match the paint.

I also didn’t think mine matched until my truck was clean and in the sunlight. Who did you buy your paint from?

 

[Skier167]

I completely understand, had similar problems. Mine was not matching well either so I repainted one of the vents 5 or 6 times. Stripped it down to chrome each time and started over. Rapid Red is a tri-coat paint which seems to be harder to match. I had my exhaust cutout rear bumper parts painted by a pro and they didn’t match. He had to repaint them again using my gas cover as the source to match the paint.

I also didn’t think mine matched until my truck was clean and in the sunlight. Who did you buy your paint from?

Local automotive paint shop. Had them mix it based on the paint code. As soon as I started spraying I knew it was too dark but hoped it would lighten up some. Even did a 2k clear on it but from what I read is the smoked quartz uses a tinted clear coat as well. I pick up the parts tomorrow morning from the painter. I left my gas door with him to match and it’s a ford collision center so hoping it comes out good. I even picked up a set of painted fender badges off eBay for $50 so I wasn’t messing with trying to paint chrome and instead painting over factory paint.

 

[Skier167]

I completely understand, had similar problems. Mine was not matching well either so I repainted one of the vents 5 or 6 times. Stripped it down to chrome each time and started over. Rapid Red is a tri-coat paint which seems to be harder to match. I had my exhaust cutout rear bumper parts painted by a pro and they didn’t match. He had to repaint them again using my gas cover as the source to match the paint.

I also didn’t think mine matched until my truck was clean and in the sunlight. Who did you buy your paint from?

here’s a pic of the door handles I did in a different light.

 

[Flash69]

Local automotive paint shop. Had them mix it based on the paint code. As soon as I started spraying I knew it was too dark but hoped it would lighten up some. Even did a 2k clear on it but from what I read is the smoked quartz uses a tinted clear coat as well. I pick up the parts tomorrow morning from the painter. I left my gas door with him to match and it’s a ford collision center so hoping it comes out good. I even picked up a set of painted fender badges off eBay for $50 so I wasn’t messing with trying to paint chrome and instead painting over factory paint.

I ordered my paint from Scratches Happen and Automotive Touchup Paint online. Both of them match really well but I had to learn the amount of each layer to match factory. It’s not a fun process for a non-painter. LOL.

I agree, it’s easy to see it does not match as soon as you start spraying, kind of crazy how our eyes can tell.

Oh yeah, your painter will match it perfectly with the gas door. Mine matched the color the first time when he had something to match it to. I’m not 100% sure Ford color codes are 100% accurate but I’m not a painter. Perhaps it something like each brand does a different mixture to achieve a match.

I do know that Rapid Red is a very soft color as I have a ton of rock chips on my 22 where my 2013 had very few chips in the 9 years I owned it. I’ll likely have to have the front of the truck painted in a year or so with all of these chips.

 

[Skier167]

I did learn talking to different painters for quotes that you can’t even use the bumper for paint matching cause they are slightly off from the body since they are painted at a different factory. I even made sure to do light coats so it wasn’t sprayed too heavy.
I had paint protection film on the front of my 12 and then didn’t do it on my 16 and it got pretty beat up from rock chips but was black so was hard to notice. I did ppf on the front of my 21 and will be one of the first things I do on every new vehicle.

 

[jhelrey]

Were you using rattle cans or a spray gun?

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