So i tried searching, and all I found was about painting it.

whats the purpose of the engine cover? like just to keep everything all nice and pretty?

just wondering.
,Kevin

 

pretty much. most new cars have a lot of plastic covering the engine. most older cars have metal everything showing.

 

they definitely look nice. and look at that...we sell them!!! LLMK! LOL

 

haha, thanks, but I think I'm gunna take mine off and go for a powdercoated valve cover.

 

yeah i like to call it the valve-cover-cover....pointless...except it does have some padding/insulation under it...maybe its for heat/sound dampening...

 

The padding just protects the plastic from warping under the heat from the engine.

 

Also helps to muffle valvetrain noise

 

sweet. thanks guys, thats what i figured, just didnt wanna do something stupid and feed dirt and crap into places it shouldnt be

 

car and driver answered this question a whiles back in their q&a section

basically, back in the day, when engines had valve covers that were sculpted and polished to be things of beauty, the cost of doing this was fairly high, so they decided it would be cheaper to disguise less sightly engines with valve covers rather than dress them up with metal covers.

they also serve some functions of heat sheilding, insulation, sound dampening, and pedestrain safety etc. but they are pretty minimal, just there to dress up the engine really.

also, funnily enough, the engine cover on the v6 hyundai tiburon had fake intake runners to make the engine look like it was longitudinally positioned instead of transversely since it is front wheel drive.