Very High Temperature paint on a BBQ

[Pete Verdon]

I've finally finished my barbecue, with the painting of the steel lid. I bought three tins of Hycote VHT paint off eBay, not thinking much more beyond "spray it on and that will be that". However, when I actually got the cans, they mentioned having to cure the paint with heat after application. Car/machine parts could be cured in use, but it warned against doing so with "domestic articles" due to the fumes produced during curing.

I stoked the barbecue up as hot as it went, and let it burn through ten kilos of lumpwood over the afternoon. I didn't notice much of a change in the paint (though when I last looked it was still too hot to touch so I haven't had a feel of the texture). Soon after it heated up, I was able to smear a streak through the thoroughly-dried paint with a matchstick - hopefully it hardened again either with heat or during cooling.

Does the panel think that will be adequate "curing"? The can didn't mention any particular temperature or length of time, and I haven't been able to find much online. I don't want to go poisoning anybody!

Pete

[geoff]

In message , Pete Verdon writes

I think you sprayed too much on

or the stuff you bought was well past its sell by date

or heated it up before most of the solvent had evaporated, although I would have thought this unlikely

I've not really had much trouble with it (I buy 12 cans at a time - a reasonably high user)

Last lot I bought cost me £1.30 / can, why bugger about with unknown crap on ebay ?

[Pete Verdon]

You think the coating has failed (presumably because of the matchstick)? It looks fine to me, I was just concerned at whether it was fully cured or might still emit toxic fumes into my food. I'll have another look at it tonight to see if the paint's still soft; like I say, I hope that the softening was part of the process, as it was hard beforehand.

As to your specific suggestions, I don't think I sprayed too much on - I was actually rather pleased with the finish at the end of painting, with no signs of thick wet clumps and nowhere near a run anywhere. Likewise it won't have been heated before drying - I painted it Saturday and cooked it on Sunday. I suppose there's the possibility of dodgy eBay-special paint, but the cans looked OK to me and the seller seemed to be a fairly high-turnover supplier of this kind of paint.

Pete

[geoff]

If you can smear it, it would indicate that either the paint hasn't taken or for some reason there's some solvent there.

Toxic fumes ?

live life in the fast lane

[Pete Verdon]

Mm. It is a lot harder now than it was while cooking. I don't want to see just how hard as I don't want to leave scratches! Perhaps it's not properly done, but it's not going to suffer much chafing etc so I've decided to leave it for now and keep an eye out for future problems.

:-) On my own behalf I would, but I rarely have a BBQ on my own and especially not now I have this monster to play with. I don't really want to poison my friends' food!

That said, I cooked a few bits and bobs on it on Sunday night over the remains of the curing fire, and nothing tasted funny or killed me, so I reckon it's good to go.

Pete