Paint fume headaches

[ebrand]

On my '70 'T', I decided to upgrade the heat exchangers w/ stainless SSIs but found they are no longer available, so I had the existing steel set blasted and painted with correct heat paint, mated to a new steel muffler painted factory grey.
Since then am enduring horrific fumes which result in dizziness, headaches and even sore throat. My tech doesn't even notice the acrid smell.
How long before the new parts calm down and the car is fume-free?
Lesson---let sleeping dogs lie.

[Fishcop]

Take the system to a powder coater and ask to have it baked for a few hours to burn off the fumes.

[denson]

That will last for a while. Powder coat is a good idea.

[gsjohnson]

Ceramic coating would be better for an exhaust...More money though.

[Schläfer]

Something doesn't stack up here. Unless the system has been painted on the inside, you shouldn't be getting this into the cabin. The paint smell would just be an external thing. Are you sure there isn't a leak somewhere and exhaust gasses getting into the heating system?

[peterf]

Something doesn't stack up here. Unless the system has been painted on the inside, you shouldn't be getting this into the cabin. The paint smell would just be an external thing. Are you sure there isn't a leak somewhere and exhaust gasses getting into the heating system?

I agree, sandblasting the old heat exchangers without patching them up raises all sorts of red flags. I would strongly recommend buying a cheap CO detector like this before driving the car any further:



Your symptoms sound like they could be from carbon monoxide poisoning.

[denson]

It could be happening at lights though. I painted my new Dansk before installing it, but never painted exchangers. It too about 5 1 hour rides to get the smell to stop. It did not go in my cabin though, so you may want to look into that as it is not typical.