Holding Small Parts While Finishing or Painting

I needed to paint 200+ small dowels and needed some way to hold them. I ask the question in the toy makers forum and got a lot of good suggestions. The problem with these suggestions were that they only work well if your making one toy and only need to hold a few parts. I needed a much better solution that would work for lots of parts.

I finally concluded that I needed something that worked perfectly for the parts I was making. It had to be cheap and easy to make.

The part is exhaust pipes for my Hot Rod Freaky Fords.

Wood Toy Car - Hot Rod Freaky Ford - Deuce Coupe

These are 1 inch long dowels that are glued into 1/4 inch deep holes. They need to be painted and leave enough pare wood for gluing.

The first thing I came up with was this.

Plywood Jig For Holding Small Parts

Plywood Jig For Holding  Wooden Toy Car Parts While Painting - Exhaust Pipes for Hot Rod Freaky Fords Drying

I just grabbed a piece of plywood that I had already and went to work. After I started painting I soon discovered that not only was it not big enough but that you need at least twice as many holes as the number of parts. What are you going to do with these parts while you are adding the second coat of paint or clear coat.

The holes are 1/4 inch deep on 1/2 inch centers.  Drilled to my next larger bit size. If the holes are not bigger the parts will get stuck.