I have rusty lead pipes that I want to paint black...would bbq paint work? has anyone painted their's and had something work well? And should I sand them down or just get rust paint?

Cheers

As far as I know, BBQ paint would work. I used some header paint that I found at fleet farm.

It will turn out better if you get all the old paint and rust off. I used one of these, and it worked pretty well.

yes...those work VERY good...
i manage to get ALL the rust off my pipes and painted it with BBQ high temp paint

I just sandblasted my pipes and painted them with high temp grill paint last week.  Turned out even better than I expected.  If you don't have access to a sandblaster then one of the sanding wheels that someone already mentioned would also work well.  When I painted, I used multiple coats sprayed on fairly thin.