Valves do more than up and down

Engine restoration and tuning starts with some cosmetic work. I removed the A/C compressor, the A/C evaporator and the A/C condenser (saving about 50 pounds) and started removing all the vacuum hoses and some electrical lines. After that I started to attack the pieces of the engine that were covered in oil debris and flaking red paint. As a refresher, here's what the engine started looking like.

So I removed a valve cover, the water neck and the thermostat housing (upper radiator). The intake manifold would be next, but I need to find out how to remove the anti-freeze and dispose of it safely. The water neck and the thermostat housing have been selected to be a nice grey and the valve cover will be a nice blue with the "International" script in a grey that matches the water neck and the thermostat housing. Enough blabbery. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

Once the cover was removed, I had to get all the rust, paint and caked on oil from the valve cover.

Then the "prime" color.

Then the masking of the script.

Then the final top coat.

All in all it was about 5 - 6 hours for the valve cover alone. I'm glad there are only 2 of these. I do think I'll pull the engine out of the body and repaint the block this blue. It looks really good.