I am painting a 27 coupe. What color should the inside of the fender wells be? The same as the rest of the body or black - color of fenders?
Body color
If its part of the body proper, body paint. If it bolts on probably black. JP
The color of the underside of your fenders depends on the color of the mud in your part of the country!
Then it is white, because the snow is too cold to produce mud.
Harold,
You are supposed to wash under the fenders when you wash the car!
Norm
What, we're supposed to wash them? Aw MAN, maybe THAT's why my white pants look so awful after a tour... lol
Norman - I remember washing under the fenders one time shortly after we bought our '23 Roadster in Montana a some 30 or so years ago. As I was doing that, I remember thinking to myself, "I wonder how many times my grandfather, a Minnesota farmer, washed under the fenders of his Model T?" After giving that thought some careful consideration, I quit washing under the fenders and haven't done it since. I think my grandfather would think I was "nuts"! I also think that washing "under" the fenders is something akin to "over-restoration".
When the Model A came out, there was the same practice of leaving the body portion of the wheel wells in body color. The dealers and customers didn't like the appearance and painted the wheel wells with black paint.
Word of this got back to Ford and eventually, the factories took on the extra step of painting the wheel wells black on the lighter colored cars. So while the dealers may have done similar on the Model T, Ford didn't do it until they were into the Model A production.
Ref: Page 66, The Ford Model A, "as Henry Built It"
To wash under the fenders is akin to changing your underwear! You can put on clean clothes, but if you don't change the underwear, you are still dirty! Anyway, especially in snow country you should wash off the salt or you will eventually have perforated fenders.
Norm
Now that certainly makes sense to me Norman. I mean the salt thing. (and yes, I do change my underwear) In Montana where we used to live, they did NOT use salt, they used "pea gravel". Out here in the Pacific Northwest, I think that they use mostly sand or gravel, and some type of modern "de-icer". Thank goodness they do not use salt! Does anybody know how corrosive this modern de-icer is in comparison to salt? I understand that it's not nearly as corrosive as salt but I still wonder how much corrosion it might cause, especially on older restored cars like Model T's. (???)