Packard Forum Index » V-8 (1955-56)

Of course any reasonable and sober minded person would never consider a blue to be red or an orange to be purple.

Keeping that in mind, there has been an ongoing debate in the Indian motorcycle world as to exactly what is Indian red (the most popular color). A debate that raged on for very strong since the popularity of the Internet as well as for at least 10 years before that i know of. A total of about 30 years.

Various 'experts' claiming to have NOS painted parts, cans of unopened paint, touch up paint in small tubes (I have one of those) etc, etc, left over from the 30's and 40's and even as far back as mid 1920's. Noone doubts the claims nor the validity of the claims that such evidence of color shades are in fact OEM material.

THE problem is that despite any attempts, whether deliberate or occuring by chance, to have preserved OEM paint has yielded no conclusive evidence as to what is the rite shade of Indian red.

I have 48 Chief still in my possesion painted with Dupont during the early 1970's. I still have 2 cans of FACTORY PACK paint that was bought at the same time i bought the paint sprayed on the bike. The bike is mostly kept covered in a garage with no lite access, the paint has oranged out alot over the last 30 years. This eviddent of touch up i do (it's laquer) about every 7 or 8 years from the paint i've kept over the decades. Even a small amount that was thinned for touch up about 30 years ago is a different shade.

All in all, after 40 years, the paint whether on the bike or in the cans, thinned or not thinned has about 3 different distince shades ( after application) ranging from a not quite marroon colored dark red (orignal factory pack shade of 1970's) to brite fire engine red to an not quite orange.

THere is no way to determine correct shade after 30 or 40 years.

OR, just exactly how many original Madonna-Lisa's are still in existence today anyway???. Last count, at least a dozen????

KD, sounds like you are painting your engine in the car. This is a difficult task to get done correctly. I did an engine compartment refurbishing on my '55 Clipper Super. I ended up taking most of the equipment out of the compartment and most of the stuff off of the engine. The result was a great improvement, but I wished now I had painted more on the engine. I described the work on my project blog: Adventures with a 1955 Clipper. We would all like to see some photos of your engine painting project. Please?

(o[]o)