A Mystery to me-Help!

mass A man

mass A man

Well-known member
I need some answers to the original paint scheme of this old truck. It's a 1931 narrow bed, Been brush painted black somewhere back in the 40's or 50's. As one can see, the firewall is the original,non-buffed out green, the front rails and seat framing is a very much lighter green, (also original) and the other day after taking a break from engine tear-down, I took some sandpaper to a rough spot on top of gas tank and found a shade of blue? or blue-green? I hope my pictures show this well enough- I've found this blue-green on other areas also. Judging from the fasteners and welting around gas tank, everything looks original, as the tank was never swapped out. Anyway, I'm confused why there is three different colors on truck. What am I missing here???:confused:
 
Last edited:
How is it you are sure the truck has not been painted, freshened, or had replacement parts over all the years it has been in service?
 
Well J, From my experience, nothing appears to be changed, I replaced the body blocks last year, Those bolts were old ford hardware,rusted in place and the "wood" was at best, looked like petrified dinosaur bones. This truck also had been tucked away for almost 50 years in an old warehouse in N.Y. I can't see any trace of "tampering" with any body part, other than someone moved the battery box to a "firewall" mount somewhere along the line.
 
I asked because I have a 1924 car (not Ford) that looked unmolested until I found a few small discrepancies showing body repairs and part replacements on one side, most likely done in the 20's or 30's. The general overall patina was good camouflage and repairs were not readily apparent.
 
You're probably right J, But I'll still be a monkeys uncle if this truck's had that many major parts swapped. Anyway,---can you tell me the names Ford used for the colors shown in my pic's??? Just for curiosities sake.
 
Well, your engine and transmission are not ford green, but ford blue. So someone certainly changed those major parts at least once. Internet colors are usually off, but FWIW, the firewall looks gunmetal blue or possibly duchess blue, I suspect it was painted when the engine was swapped.
The seat riser is too yellow for rock moss green... it could be balsam green, but it looks a lot like rustoleum forest green, and the gas tank looks like it could have been lombard blue or niagara dark blue. I would think that tank color on the bottom of the paint layers is an original color, but is it the original tank? If you look at the back of the gas tank between the firewall odds are the original color is still there on the tank and at the top of the inside firewall. . My pickup had 5 different colors on it once I started stripping it. A lot can happen in 80 years. My firewall was gunmetal at the bottom of the paint layers. The back of the tank was blue rock green...someone swapped the tank once. Since yours is a 31, there is a huge choice of colors and lombard , valley green and niagara dark are three of them..
 
Thank you Pat for the color names, I will write it all down for future use. Motor was definitely swapped out at one time- That I do know. I highly doubt this truck had a firewall swap or cab floor swap at any time, but you may be right, anything could happen in 80 yrs!!! The paint still looks original to me after scraping and detecting all in a good light. Checked under tank and way up inside firewall just now, and as I did a long time ago,It is same color as outside of firewall.--green. Thanks kindly for your time with me on this crazy curiosity of mine!
 
order a copy of the 3rd printing of the Paint and Finish Guide...it has a lot of great information about how and with what the cars and trucks were painted, as well as all the colors used and large paint chips you can use to identify and color match. The story about how the cars were assembled and painted is actually very interesting reading. The authors really knocked themselves out in documenting the entire painting process. You won't be disappointed.
 
As a side note on curiosities in paint My 1924 car, a Willys Knight had a nice surface rust patina, (I thought). But the original paint was perfectly intact under years of multiple coats of clear varnish that had seriously aged and yellowed.
 

Attachments

  • Willys Knight.jpg
    Willys Knight.jpg
    98.1 KB · Views: 28
That's a fine looking Willys, Mr. Franklin. Freshen up the mechanicals and run it as-is. The new trend seems to be running survivors, warts and all.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top