1963 Jaguar E-Type OTS
The story of a ground up restoration of a classic "XKE" Jaguar roadsterPaint Information: Guide
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GuideEveryone who attempts a restoration at some point wrestles with paint colors. In my case, I wanted to paint my car a color that was of the period, but not the same color as what it was when I acquired it. That color may or may not have been original in any case, since the car had been repainted. The job becomes, first, finding what colors were available at manufacture and, second, discovering what currently available paints match the color you want. With a couple of exceptions, the first task is fairly easy. The second is a little more difficult. There are, of course, people who not only want a "true" color, but close-to-original paint chemistry. They want cellulose paint, for example, even though the modern paint technologies offer more durability and are easier to apply. I don't have much to offer those people. I've put together data from various sources to establish the range of years when certain names of paints (as opposed to their colors) were used. I make the distinction between names and colors because the same name may serve for subtly different colors over a period of time, or the same color might bear a different name in different years. "British Racing Green" probably looked a little different in 1962 from what it did in 1973 — maybe. "Imperial Maroon" and "Claret" may have looked the same in their respective years. As of June 2004, sources for the year ranges are
(I have yet to incorporate two other sources into the database, namely, Philip Porter and Mark Hicks. The trouble I've run into with sources is that they tend to cross-reference each other, thus amplifying any errors. We need a more authoritative source. See "Follow Up" below.) I found that there was much agreement among sources, but also some interesting differences. Most of the differences probably arise from cut-offs that the sources used; some may use model year while others might use year of manufacture. The interesting differences come up with a handful of colors, and they may be matters of confusion. These interesting colors are
Here's my take on these colors: "British Racing Green" is interesting because a couple of sources (with perhaps one of those relying on the other) say that BRG was unavailable for a couple of years midway in the run of the E-type (1965/66 - 1967/68). This itself is interesting, since BRG seems to me a rock-solid baseline color to expect from a British sports car manufacturer. "Old English White" and "Cream" are on the list because they are easily confused. I have heard of one person who had to have his car repainted because a paint shop confused the two. I happen to think that the names and the colors are different, with "Cream" running from the Series 1 through the Series 2 and "Old English White" running (perhaps) through the last few years of E-type production. "Dark Blue" may have been an option beginning with the year that "Opalescent Dark Blue" was phased out (probably 1964). Because sources differ, I decided to use a consensus approach to the issue. Years when color was used: consensus approach The table below lists years when sources claim paints were used for the E-type in a "consensus" fashion. This is much like a sum of the information provided from the sources. Black and grey colors indicate depth of consensus, with lighter shades of grey indicating fewer sources agreeing and dark grey or black indicating more consensus among them. Of course, combined misinformation is still misinformation, but the consensus provides some glimpse of probability of truth, whereas just taking a single source's word doesn't have that informational depth. (Individual paint color pages, available from the links on the left, show what individual sources have to say on the range of years.) I've arranged the color names more or less chronologically, with the later names appearing lower on the list. (By the way, colors shown on the links are not even approximate — they are grossly estimated within the limited palette allowed in web browsers!)
Absent on this list are "Imperial Maroon," "Opalescent Silver Grey," "Silver," and "Sherwood Green" — and perhaps others I don't know about. Those colors are confusing to me and sometimes data is not easily available. Also, I was a bit confused by the absence of "Black" in 1974. I have read that the last car to come off the Jaguar E-type line was black, in September 1974. (See Nigel Thorley, Jaguar E-Type: A Celebration of the World's Favourite '60s Icon. Haynes' Great Cars. [Somerset: Haynes Publishing, 2001], 144.) Some colors are known under different names, I believe. When I was confident that a color was named that was generally known under a different name I indicated that in the record. This might clarify some of the confusion, but in general the "aliases and misnomers" are apparent. (I know that two authorities vociferously defend their spellings of a certain important, very red color.) Paint codes were gleaned from many sources, none of which will vouch for their accuracy, I am sure. These codes certainly will provide you some basic information about what paint code may have been used by a paint manufacturer at some time. Unfortunately, you will probably find that the paint codes provided here (with few exceptions) are no longer valid, though paint shops might be able to map the old codes to valid current codes. Much of the information I found was hopelessly outdated, but in my case even outdated information provided enough for paint shops to work with. My paint story involved using Dupont and PPG paint codes to corroborate the choice of code — I could have used either Dupont or PPG paints. Whenever it was possible, I have supplied a year when the code was valid or recorded. Sources for paint codes were the same as for the years (except for Haddock), with the addition of codes gleaned from the Jag Lover's E-type forum (http://forums.jag-lovers.org) and from AutoColorLibrary.com. Manufacturers cover the gamut: PPG, Dupont, RM, ICI, Ditzler (PPG), Glasurit. Do not assume that colors will be the same between manufacturers. Subtle differences in shade may exist, and more obvious differences will be apparent in the so-called "metallic" or "opalescent" paints. These might have quite visible differences in the size and density of "flake." In the end, you'll choose a color because you like it and, if you are so inclined, because you deem it "authentic enough" for your purposes. A good way to do this is to buy a pint of the color finalists, and spray them to see how they really look. Let me be blunt: You are a fool if you simply order any paint based solely on any of the paint codes listed on a paint information page here or anywhere else on the Internet. Use some method of corroborating or otherwise checking the color. Clarifying color names in the years. The differences between some sources are probably worth following up by people who are more meticulous than me and who might have more complete resources. I think that a group with access to records of manufacture or even a subset of them (like XKEdata.com) might be able to clarify more definitively what names of colors were available in what years. I think that the confusion among sources comes from people taking examples of colors on cars and assigning a name to the color. You mix up a color name, and instantly you might introduce a new color to the palette for a year of manufacture. Determining year ranges of color names as they appear on "heritage certificates" would probably define the color names. (Might be fairly easy to do with "heritage" data reported to XKEdata?) Adding to the paint codes. Paint codes are a moving target. Getting new ones for the color names would be a good thing, so that people can begin searches with current information. Email me a paint code and a short description of how you landed on it, and I'll add the code to the data base. Verifying to the paint codes. I was thankful that Dupont offered to pull old chips from their archives and check out a current color against it. The paint shop made the call to Dupont and discussed the differences between the old and new chips. The difference according to them was flake size, with the current paint having a little larger flake. Obtaining archival information from Jaguar or from the manufacturers of Jaguar paints over the years of manufacture would be especially valuable. I'm not interested in doing this at this point, since I feel I now know more about paints than I intended to learn in the first place! Please send comments, updates, and corrections to mdelong [at] nc.rr.com. |