Bellhousing Paint Question

[JeffAARy]

I'm doing an auto-to-manual conversion on my 71 Cuda.  I've got a used bellhousing that needs paint.  Do I use street hemi orange engine paint or another paint?  Primer?

[72hemi]

I believe it is suppose to be hemi orange.

[Chryco Psycho]

from what I know the bell was bolted to the engine when the engine was painted , the tranny was not painted so most of the bell that was visable was painted but not the whole bell , with the cast bells they will rust so I generally paint them with Cast blast to look like raw iron first then paint them engine color , the alum is not as critical but Eastwoods Spray grey looks just like natural alum so I paint them with that to maintain the finish

[Alaskan_TA]

This shows original paint;

[t1971Chally]

Guys,
I talked with some of the older employees at the Chrysler Kokomo Transmission Plant today where I work and they do not ever recall the transmission being painted.  They always had the natural gray appearance that Chryco Psycho mentions in the previous post.
twiles

[Alaskan_TA]

Transmissions were assembled at a different plant than the engines.

In the case of the photo above, the engine plant (Windsor, Ontario) assembled the bellhousing (not the transmission itself) to the engine as part of the engine assembly. This is a four speed car, so the bellhousing received orange overspray when the engine was painted.

[JeffAARy]

The re-worked bellhousing Keisler sent me definitely has oversprayed blue paint (I'm guessing this came off a 72-74 small block).  Only the part closest to the engine has paint, which is consistent with the photo above.