@retrofan,
I can see what you're getting at. If the fan was inside the shielding as well, and you had strategic holes drilled into the shielding, then potentially yes the cooling would be improved I think because the air flow would be more concentrated over all of the components.
If you didn't drill any ventilation holes then no the cooling would not be improved because the hot air would stay inside the shielding.
Painting the shielding black is a good idea though. I have tried to convince my partner that for maximum efficiency we should paint all our radiators in the house black, but she's having none of it. Apparently the radiators would no longer be asthetically pleasing to the eye. So as long as it looks good, right? :lol:
In practice though I'm not sure by how much the heating system efficiency would be improved by painting the radiators black. I would like to try it, and generally my partner is very patient with my crazy experiments, but she draws the line there I'm afraid!!!
AH