1913 Ford Touring - If it ain't green, what is it?

[James_Lyons-WV]

Closing out my previous thread about the 1913 Touring I just purchased which was painted Dark green about 70 years ago, I took George Mills advice and found a discreet place in the front door jamb and started sanding. I didn't go wall the way to 2000 grit, but I did finish up with 800 and then rubbing compound. As an extra step, I clear coated the area that I worked, if for any other reason to protect the exposed areas of metal, and to help the colors stand out.

If I am just basing the decision on this one location, then I think we can come to a definite conclusion that the car was NOT green from the factory.

The left one-third of the photo shows the very black fender in the background, which can be used as a baseline for determining color. You can see that the sanding process took me through the green, into a red oxide layer that was applied as part of the 50's restoration, into what I assume is the original color of the car, to another red oxide layer, and then finally to bare metal.

The million-dollar question is: What color is that which is sandwiched between the red oxide layers? Is it black? Or the darkest of "blue's"??
My daughter see's black. I see very dark blue when comparing it to the fender in the background.

What say you?

[hull 433]

This makes much more sense, and helps answer the question. Now all the hypothesis about early green can be laid to rest. Thanks for doing the paint sampling.

The car was painted at the factory, repainted once in its service life, and once again to green during its refurbishment. The in service repaint was well done with a primer layer, while the repaint was not so involved.

I saved your photo and played around with settings on my computer to see if anything would show up. I could get a slight bit of blue on the factory layer, but thats it and thats by no means reliable. Here's a chart of the layers, from factory up. I listed the factory paint as "black, or blue-black."

[James_Lyons-WV]

Stan,
I didn't know if the black layer under the green was from a previous paint job or if they put down red primer, a basecoat of black, and then a topcoat of dark green. Either way, that is how the colors stack up.

Depending on what lighting is used affects how the color shows up. Add to that, the digital camera can also fudge things around. To my eye, when comparing the blue-black to the fender in the background, it's obvious that it has a dark blue tint. Others may see it differently. The detectors in our eyes are different.

I need to get it outside when it's sunny and reflect some sunlight on it and see how it looks. But the other problem is that the area I sanded is about the size of the average thumbnail. So that strip of blue-black is probably only about .050" wide. Not a large surface area to be gauging from for sure. Regardless, it appears to be different from that of the black fenders.

Thanks for the artwork on the color stack up. It's an interesting topic.
Jim

[Dan Hatch]

Did ford use a primer then? Or was body stripped from original paint and then painted twice?

[James_Lyons-WV]

Dan - They did use a red oxide in 1913 according to Bruce's book. I don't have it in front of me but it's in the 1913 section where he talks about the paint process.

[Erik Johnson]

A good place to look for original factory paint on a 1950s restoration is under the uphostered kick panels.

My father has owned his 1917 touring for 75 years. He had it repainted in 1950 or '51 (I'll have to ask) with the body still on the chassis.

A few years ago, he re-did the kick panels for a second time and I got a good look at the exposed, interior sides of the body and door panels. All of the original factory overspray and drips are still on the interior side of the body and doors.

[James_Lyons-WV]

Stan - I blew up the upper left quadrant of the sanded area to the point where I could see the image at the individual pixels. The black fender is still seen to the left. Under magnification, the blue color of the original paint really starts to pop whereas the black fender to the left remains unchanged. I'm starting to think that this car was blue.