The black plastic under the painted lovers is fading in spots. So I want to give it a fresh coat of flat black, higher temp paint. Need to get the lovers off 1st though.

 

You should leave your talk of plastic lovers for another forum.....

It looks like the louvers are attached with typical one-time use plastic clips found on most of the plastic trim pieces on our cars. You can either use a flathead screwdriver wrapped with tape (to protect the paint) or a putty knife to get them off, but buy some extras ahead of time to replace the few of them that will undoubtedly break or be loose when reused. They're usually pretty cheap at the dealer and the same exact ones will be used many places on the car so they usually have them in stock. Or buy a set of the plastic trim removal tools (<$20) at your local auto parts store if you don't want to use the screwdriver or knife.

 

Perhaps this could be a warranty issue and the dealer will replace them? IMO, worth finding out.

 

This is correct. I have not done it myself (the body shop did) and here's what it looks like disassembled (in this case being prepped for a new paint):

 

Going to try the plastic trim removal tools since I have a set. When I look at the E-Cat there appear to be clips holding it together but it is really unclear as to where they are. You can't see them and I suspect they may be in between the plastic base and the painted louvers.