Okay on my 73 2.0 resto I am wondering what to do for my HE. While some Stainless would be nice. My stock ones are in great shape. So I just want to make them look nice again. What do you guys recommend? What have you done with good results? Thought about Ceramic coating them but not even sure that would work.

I would take them to someone who will blast them and then either paint them with VHT paint or get them ceramic painted.

1st step is kill the rust. short of ripping them apart the only way is to immerse them.
Find yourself a container that one will fit in completely & be tall enough to cover the down pipes.
Buy a few gals of Apple cider vinegar min 5% acidity fill the sucker up & let soak for a day or two.
Wash & neutralize with a bake soda THEN blast the outsides & paint with a HI zinc content paint like a cold galvanizing compound.
Cheap & effective

I sent mine out for ceramic coating and they came back looking great. I used Jet-Hot for the coating.

I agree with George! Apparently the stock heaters exchangers are more quiet. For me it's all about less noise.

Paul

if all your interested is how nice they look on the outside & are ok with breathing heated ferric oxide...
You could just blast & ceramic coat

I'd go for Jet Hot coating too. I had a set of 6 heat exchangers done, and they've held up great

Just saying that there is quite a lot of ferric oxide in nature. And in cereals boosted with iron. I would worry more about CO. Sounds and looks like these are in pretty good shape though.

Couldn’t agree more that ceramic coating them is what you should do. Take a look at this set of 911 HE’s for how great the finish is once done. This set BTW was is much worse shape then your set. You can also choose a different finish then the polished stainless steel option I went with.

Click to view attachment

Can Jet Hot be done in dull grey like the original color ?

They have a few color options, including a nice gray

Jet Hot Coatings

To my earlier point here is some correspondence I got from Jet hot related to plating heater boxes:

In other words they cook any part they receive to burn off grease & contaminants then they blast them before coating.
...Just like any plater/powder coater worth their salt.
The problem remains for OE mild steel HE's which are likely rusty inside the boxes, that de-grease process wont affect or remove that rust.
Since the air path for the heated air includes those rusty pipes ..<insert coughing emoji>
Pretty on the outside rusty on the inside.

Hey Rich, So if I used the process you recommended to get rid of the rust. Would jet-hot coating them after be okay?

Absolutely

For this to be real effective shouldn't you hot tank the exchanger first to get rid of the baked on grease?