I'm repainting my bumpers and fairing on my X and would like to paint the faded and oxidized headlight surrounds and the inner grill but I'm not sure what color to go with. Anybody have any ideas?

I'm headed to pick up more paint here pretty soon so I thought I'd pitch this out before I left to see if anybody had any ideas.

I used black on all my plastic pieces, and I like it. Make sure you use Krylon Fusion paint!! Excellent on plastic and long lasting.

drake use the same color that you painted the rest of the stuff with, so it will all look the same

I kinda like how many has "transitional colors". The black bumpers and then the headlight surrounds are a shade darker than my silver paint and the grill... hell I have no idea what the grill used to be. The previous owner apparently tried some type of cleaner you aren't supposed to use on plastics so now it's faded and speckled really bad.

I wanted to get the Krylon Fusion but they didn't have it in the black I wanted. They only had a high-gloss. I'm using Dupli-Color and it's working great and dries in about 15 minutes.

I'll head to O'Reilly's this time (since I've been to Advanced like 4 times this week) and see what they have.

I'm partial to black EPOXY appliance pant ya get from the home depot...
The shiz iz ROCK HARD and won't chip after a 5 day full cure!

I've gone with Dupli-Color gray for the rear metal bumper and Krylon Fusion satin black for the plastic bumpers. Then for the headlight trim and the crossbar on the grill I found a semi-metallic silver by Dupli-Color that looks really good. It's a little lighter than I wanted but it was the closest thing to OEM I found.

The front bumper is drying right now from where I did an acetone wipedown on it and then it's ready for paint. All that's left after that is to put the jigsaw puzzle back together.

I must say for my first time painting a vehicle and using a rattle-can at that... it looks pretty damn good if I must say so myself. I'll hopefully have pics of the completed project tonight and then I'll do a "How-to" on it. There's a lot of disassembly instructions others could use for stuff like changing headlights, side markers and stuff like that.

Now to find some superglue to fix where I broke the screw mount of the damn front mud flap!

I'm starving! All I've had today is a butt-load of cigarettes and a mt. dew!

lol drake go get you a burger.. LOL



oh yeah i forgot the front end is apart.. LOL

I used the Fusion High Gloss on mine, and its probally closer to a semi gloss than a high gloss. I may have to find this satin finish you speak of.

Well it's finished! I'm uploading the pics as we speak.

It's not bad but maybe next weekend I can take some 3000 grit sandpaper and wet sand some spots. The paints not fully cured so it's still pretty gummy.

I only had 4 broken xmas tree screws and a snapped mudflap tab leftover! lol

Drake, did you ever write a How-to on all of the work you did repainting the plastic bits? I wasn't able to find it in the DIY section. Do you have any before/after pics? I'm looking into repainting all of mine this weekend. Also, what color grill would you recommend for the Green/Gold model?

Thanks!
-Chad

if you look at my album on my page profile i did the same thing as drake i have a khaki and i painted everything black

Jdubbau02, I had never heard that color referred to as khaki, that's awesome. Your X looks sweet with the re-painted plastic bits, perfect example of what I want mine to look like (but '01). Did you use Krylon Matte Black as well?

Here's mine: http://www.clubxterra.org/forums/showthread.php?t=3716

It's not really a how-to but it shows what I used and the aftermath.

Hey Drake,

Funny thing is, I just refinished my headlight bezels this weekend too! What a coincidence. I had sun damage across the top of my headlight bezels that i had wanted to repair for awhile. Results are pretty damn good. Coworkers thought they were new.

I have alot of dissasembly pics and before-after pics that I took along the way. I started the disassembly on Thursday evening, sanded and painted Friday afternoon, let clear coat dry overnight and had everything put back together by Saturday around noonish. Once the clear coat cures I will polish them upfor a smoother feel). I think Xterra owners will like the reference pics for how to remove center grille, lower brush fascia and headlights. Nissan has a lot of "secret-squirrel" fasteners to get to. I can't upload pics until later (i'm at work right now...shhhhh). I also took notes so will put together a nice step-by-step write-up on the project.

Btw, the paint supplies i used were:

Sandpaper: 3M 320 grit; Modelmaster super fine grit papers
Primer: Duplicolor primer (12 oz.)
Paint: Duplicolor Medium Charocoal Metallic (DSFM225) (5 oz.)
Clear Coat: Duplicolor Acrylic Enamel (12 oz.)
Other: Bucket w/ water, sponge, terry cloth, microfiber cloth

I used black on all my plastic pieces, and I like it. Make sure you use Krylon Fusion paint!! Excellent on plastic and long lasting.

I disagree with that statement....I used that on my rear bumper plastic top....its already cracking and peeling off and its not been a year since I hit it with Krylon Fusion Plastic paint....black also....will have to redo it again and this time, I'm going with Duplicolor paint....used it on my grille last month and its holding up great.

herc it

herc it

X2 I plan to herc all of the plastics on my truck. I like the black instead of the stock gray.

Here are a couple of before and after pics:

Before (note the sun damage):
http://i534.photobucket.com/albums/ee345/Jackal_TEF/XTERRA/PICT0837.jpg

After:
http://i534.photobucket.com/albums/ee345/Jackal_TEF/XTERRA/PICT0877.jpg

Another shot of finished bezels:
http://i534.photobucket.com/albums/ee345/Jackal_TEF/XTERRA/PICT0878.jpg

Closeup of refinished area with previous sun damage:
http://i534.photobucket.com/albums/ee345/Jackal_TEF/XTERRA/PICT0880.jpg

What color did you use Jackal?

I like mine but will probably be redoing the front-end now that I have access to a paint booth. The silver on mine matches the Silver Ice paint of the body but I'm looking for a more transitional color between the silver and black. Like a gunmetal or something like it.

Drake the color was Duplicolor "Medium Charcoal Metallic" with a few layers of Duplicolor Acryllic clear coat over it. Both Checker and Autozone had the color.

To see the pictorial of the project go here:
http://www.clubxterra.org/forums/album.php?albumid=203