i am repainting the car along with its new rear gts quarter pannels, glass fibre front, cup mirrors etc and im having trouble to decide which direction to go. do i keep it original or opt for a new colour?

the colour at the minute is crystal green metallic which sounds nicer than it is. i would describe it as pale washed out pastel with a hint of green, old fashioned looking! the interior is a combination of colours with black carpet, dark matt green and beige leather.

any opinions?

 

If you are going to put the new gts rear on it I would do the car just like you want it. The reason that I bought a white car was because I wanted a white car. If you re-paint it and it's done right you will never regret it.

 

if you're doing all that other work, keeping the original color isn't going to do anything to the value of the car.

do it.

 

Brown.

Ok, how about a really bright green ?

Something to note is that changing colors is a lot more work than just a repaint. There's a few places that are hard to paint and you end up disassembling the car to do it right. Like taking the rear hatch off and maybe the doors. I recently painted the whole car myself (with my kid) and it was maybe sixty hours of labor to prep the car, and I didn't paint some things. I guess 50% more to up to double that to do it all "right."

 

ok, im not actualy painting it myself but i am supervising the process. the car is in a reputable shop where im happy for the work to be undertaken, heres a pic of the work so far. ive been giving serious thought to a brighter green, but then if im changing the colour why not something brighter again like speed yellow or continental orange? i agree, resale value isnt the issue here... im just hesitant to comit to a dramatic colour change. how would it feel six months later, and would the engine bay really bug me?

 

Go for the full color change.
How about something like a rich dark green metallic? I believe the eariler years had a color called Moss Green that's very nice.

 

If your thinking of Speed Yellow Here is an Example

 

allways a fan of yellow.. and orange... and classy metallics! and i havent got too long to decide either, if only i had more tnan one car...

 

OK, Brown metallic is very classy!

I see you're deep into it with the windows out. Just need to do a few more like that and a color change will work fine.

BTW - I did the bumpers if you need some tips.

 

glen,

do tell about the bumpers. i am so far assuming the shop knows how to handle plastic as ive seen the odd piece of bike fairing in there. any tips?

 

I am in the process of disassembling my car in order to do a repaint. The factory color is called palisander metallic #474 for 81'. The color name was changed to metallic rosewood for 82' but still has the same code #. Anyway, I really wanted to paint the car Amazon green metallic, but after looking at what I needed to do to change the color I decided to go with the factory color. Actually I went to the website of one of the Australian members who show all of the paint colors on actual cars. I really liked my color on the examples shown on his site so that helped me make up my mind. Good luck.

 

Doing the bumpers is sort of an all-or-nothing affair. If the bumper has not been repainted, then it could be painted over. It is essential to add a flex additive to the paint in any case. Having multiple layers, flexed or not, increases the chance that a minor bump will cause a crack or the large spider crack that was on the car previously. That bumper was totalled in an accident, but motivated me to "do it right."

Stripping the bumper is a lot of work. I looked into having it blasted clean and the best I could get was glass bead blasting. It was ineffective and they would not spend the hours required to do it. I tried to find someone who did CO2 beads or walnut shells but I came up empty. Sandblasing would be too aggressive, I was told. I'm in a large city and was surprised that I couldn't find someone to take on this work sucessfully. A body shop said they would sand it down before painting and quoted six hours for the job. So that's what we did. (Actually my son did!)

The sanding requires a lot of patience and care. The original paint was put on over two coats of primer. Just getting down to the primers is OK, it doesn't have to be bare. From what I could tell, there's a yellow layer likely for plastic adhesion then a grey layer for sticking the paint to that. It is really hard to get it sanded evenly and, with the curves of the bumpers, ended up looking like an agate with swirls of different colors. The plastic is black so it's clear when to stop on an area.

We used both electric sanders and hand sanding. There's no way to get into some of the features with a sander. I'd estimate the time was 6 to 8 hours per bumper.

Painting is comparatively easy. As some plastic was exposed, I started with a special plastic adhesion layer. At the "pro" shops it can be found in spray cans. That has a flash time of five to ten minutes and then you've got to prime it so the work progresses quickly. I used an acrylic enamel paint. The primer I choose didn't accept a flex additive. The paint guys said that was OK as the primer wasn't that stiff. Then top coated (3 layers) with paint with the flex additive.

To maintain an even color match, the flex additive must be used on the entire car. This is especially important if you're doing a metallic, which is hard to get right.

The common statement I got was that you didn't have to use the additive if it was being painted on the car. I think that is wrong and had visions of the old bumper to remind me. I also think that the bumper covers on the 928 are softer than most they see.

 

As far as the engine compartment, you can always do a little bit of spraying of flat black, to cover any areas that really bother you. But in most cases, I do not think a repaint really changes the value of the car that much. The only concern potential buyers have, is to be sure the car was not in an accident. Very few people are really concerned with keeping the old, original colors, and old, checkerboard seats, etc. Most people would prefer an updated interior, and updated color. So few people will complain if you choose to upgrade. It just makes the car look nicer.

 

I think colour changes can definatly be a good thing, however when a colour change is done, I think that they should do a complete job, strip out the interior and engine bay and do it all at once, that way noone knows

 

thanks for all the input, its helped me to decide and i will change the colour. now ive only to decide which one to choose! i am leaning towards burnt orange at the minute... will post more pics later.