Packard Forum Index » Pre-War (1899-1942)

Greetings. I'm doing the engine on a 1407 V-12 Club Sedan. The customer wants to do a color change sometime down the road and wants to paint the firewall while the engine is out. I've never really paid any attention to firewall colors before. Are those firewalls painted body color or black? Thanks.

Body color, according to the PI engine room judging guide.

I talked to Marano a while back and he told me they came both ways.

Could be I suppose, the known exceptions to the body color that I'm aware of are 1934 and 1953/1954 Caribbeans.

My 38 super 8 came that way when I bought it, but I know it had a repaint at 1 time.

Maybe an individual custom body on an ordered chassis, but not on a production car. If the guy wants to change the color someday he will have to say just that. I don't know what level of paint job he is planning, but saying you are doing something to save money on Packards sounds ridiculous. Just the gas bill alone is going to be more than the cost of painting the firewall.

I thought the original Caribbeans I saw had body color on the firewall. Maybe Mitchell-Bentley might do something like that if a color change was made in the middle of the order. I knew backyard guys who painted that stuff black to avoid the hassle of doing the job as built. On second thought one of them was owned by Beardslee and probably was repainted, another was owned by a Mobil oil guy and probably was repainted by a body shop, a third was light blue but so dirty who knows, finally a fourth was a White and black 54 that was wrapped around a telephone pole and I think it was black wash on the firewall. I should have taken more pictures. I never saw one of those cars that was well taken care of. So until a well kept, low mileage, original shows up I will go with cheap black wash on the 53-54 Caribbean firewall. Along with newspaper packed under the fender trim that accelerated deterioration. Oh, and another one that had overspray on it, but I think was black as well.

34 still had the separate firewall panel and every original one I ever saw was standard black. I suppose someone could tell the dealer to change it, but without the original invoice I'm inclined to the convenient history conclusion. It can be yanked off and repainted, but why would someone want that? Certainly not in a chauffeur driven car and who living in Old Westbury would tell the groundskeeper that he was going to do the oil changes himself?

Thanks, guys. I'm going with body color.