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

Does anyone have modern DuPont formulas for the 1937 Packard Cream and 1939 Havana Beige colors? I have DuPont paint chips with the original lacquer formulas, but have not been able to cross-reference the original formulas to modern acrylic enamel paints.

G'day Mike,

See it's your first post so to Packardinfo. And sorry, but I can't help with your question.

However I invite you to add your Packard/s to the Owner Registry together with a Pic, any known history and how you acquired it/them.

Hi Mike,

Glad you posted your question since we talked Saturday.

I know this is a 'backwards' suggestion, BUT what shape are your paint chips? Can you get a DuPont dealer that remixes acrylics to experiment with a best match to your chips?

Perhaps you tried that already?

There are guys on PInfo here that know paint much better than I. What do the rest of you know out there???

Dan Leininger
DanL

Mike,

Here is an interesting discussion of another guys search for a color:

forums.aaca.org/ubbthreads.php/topics/519044/Packard_Paint_help

DanL

Any good paint dealer can mix all the paint you want if you tell them the original name or number of the color.

They will not have the formula on hand but they can get it from the "head office" within a day or 2.

Colors back to the 20s are available this way. The oldest I have personally bought was for a 1952 Chrysler, and this was from Sikkens a company that was not even in business in this country in 1952.

Mike,
for adding your '40 110 Club Coupe to the Registry. Interesting history there, I'm eagerly awaiting the continuation of the story. And would be interested in seeing some pic's too.

Any good paint dealer can mix all the paint you want if you tell them the original name or number of the color.

They will not have the formula on hand but they can get it from the "head office" within a day or 2.

Rusty, I think you overstate the simplicity a bit. There are quite a few colors where myself and others have been unable to get a match from the major paint suppliers. Some pigments are only available for acrylic and nitrocellulose lacquers and not for urethanes, and visa versa. The very small particle size metallic flakes used from the 30s thru the 50s are not always available and you either have to settle for larger flakes, or have them custom milled to smaller size.

But there aren't too many colors you can't come close to matching using the Sikkens color match system that uses the (thousands of) colored circles that you put your original part beneath of match. This is a pretty neat system and generally gives you options from available colors. I'd advise to view the colors in natural daylight though and especially avoid looking at them under flourescent light. But it too has the limitation that sometimes the color you want is only available in the paint system you didn't want to use.

Mike,
Have you looked at the Auto Color web site, they claim to have color chips for most cars from about the late 1920's including Packard, they can also supply the paint .
tcpglobal.com/autocolorlibrary/acl_files/packard.html
I bought a colour chip for my 1929 Packard from them.
David -Australia

Many of the old codes are not transferable to modern codes so you have to use a system similar to what Owen_Dyneto suggests. It can be very time consuming and not a perfect science. I got lucky with matching the '41 Grove Green Metallic as an old paint guy took the time and found a perfect match . . . an AMC color from 1971. Imagine, my Clipper is now painted Gremlin Green!!!! This is very hard for me to admit in a public forum!

As long as anything "gremlin" is only a name in the paint.