I thought this was interesting. My son has a 2020 Fit with 70,000 miles on it. The brake drums are rusty. A friend bought a 2020 Fit with 22,000 miles on it, and the drums are a nice black. I wonder if the dealer who sold that Fit painted the drums or if the lower mileage kept them looking "pretty." It seems like a lot of work for the deal to go to just to get black drums. Maybe that's a standard part of used car prep.

I usually clean and paint rusty brake drums, and I'll do that with both of our Fits (mine and my son's) in the spring.

 

I doubt they would go through the trouble of painting it, but maybe.

My fit has a matte black coating on the rear drums from the factory.
I assume mileage, driving and storage conditions contributed to the state of the brake drums.

I keep my 2019 garaged 99% of the time and there's no rust on the drums.

 

If his car ever had the drums replaced by a chain shop (Midas, Car-X, Meineke etc) chances are the new drums didn't have the same black coating or paint or whatever it is that is on the OEM Honda drums. So they rusted quicker.

 

car S has been driven spirited and heated up drums and paint has flaked off, car F has been driven like granny, brakes never heated up, paint never flaked off.....maybe

 

Funny. Definitely not me or my son.

 

There is this stuff call rush converter it applies like paint, available in both spray and paint on, it changes iron oxide into another chemical form, once dry it looks like black primer and is ready for paint or leave it as a primer. Can get it at home depot.

 

I've used several products like that, with limited success.

 

Cheap aftermarket brake parts are never painted. Just covered in an anti-rust material or coating. It's meant to last and look nice during storage. But once mounted they will rust very quickly due to not being painted properly. You stock Honda parts are painted from the factory but the black coating doesn't last forever. People living in the rust belt have even larger issues with rusty parts due to the road salt used there.

 

I wouldn't recommend any universal Home Depot products for automotive rust repair here. You are much better off using specific high temp paint used for automotive applications. Which there are plenty of products to choose from. Home products are for sure not designed for high heat, road conditions, and other factors.

 

Definitely! Heat resistant paint is easy to find.