Gold Air Cleaner Lid - 1968

[DeVille68]

Hi Mark

If you have the digital color info, then we might be able to match the color without sample. That would be fantastic, because its now 5 years later and the gold paint on my air cleaner could use a respray.

Best regards,
Nicolas

[TJ Hopland]

Ya I too was thinking if it started as a digital scan reading in theory you could just give those numbers to any paint shop that has digital mixing equipment and they have as much chance as any other shop of getting it right. 

I have never looked close when I have done it, isn't it a simple X,Y coordinate?  I don't think its anything special to the paint industry but thinking further there has to be a little more to it since there is the gloss or matte aspect too that I assume is also part of the reading they take.

[Gene Beaird]

I went through this a few years ago while wanting to freshen up the underhood area of our Calais.  I ran across this forum post:  https://forums.cadillaclasalle.club/index.php?topic=120480.msg209769#msg209769

Which indicated the color was matched to a Chrysler color called Drama Gold, Sherwin Williams number 51525.  It did seem to match well, and it's what is on our car now. 

The '472' decal on our Calais was originally a decal, thin film stuff like you use on model aircraft and such,  NOT a vinyl-like thing.  Since all the reproduction stuff you can get these days is vinyl, I had my paint guy make a mask out of vinyl, so we could paint the label on the snorkel.  That plan, sadly, failed when it turned out the gold paint was too 'hot' and dissolved the vinyl. 

When our paint guy moved shops, and seemed to have lost our air cleaner, I located a used one and it had the 'wrap-like' label on it, in that the label was solid, more paper-like, and wrapped mostly around the snorkel.  I still have this lower air cleaner assembly on our car.  I need to strip it and have another go at painting the label on it using skills I've learned building scale models. 

I'll paint the base, semi-gloss black color, lay the mask on, spray an over-coat of semi-gloss acrylic and let that set.  After that, then, paint the mask gold and then peel it off shortly after it sets.