Underside colors - why do some match car color?

[72bluNblu]

This picture appears to me to show that the hump was originally blue then oversprayed black. The black makes it hard to tell, but I believe the color underneath it is blue, not primer.



You officially piqued my interest, so I folded back the carpet on my Challenger (easy to do, my carpet is not stock and is a bit of a disaster). Anyway, my Challenger is a '72, built at Hamtramck. This is the passenger side front and rear of the transmission hump and parts of the passenger side floor. Clearly B3, the original color of my car, and with good coverage. Also has black overspray , the top of the tunnel and shifter bracket are black, not sure if that was factory or not.

['Cuda Hunter]

71 barracuda

It had one or two repaint's.   No one touched the inside with the respray's.

['Cuda Hunter]

Mine appears to have been painted after the seam sealer went in.
The rear inners show this pretty well.

It looks as if 72 blu's car had the seam sealer installed after paint.

[72bluNblu]

Mine appears to have been painted after the seam sealer went in.
The rear inners show this pretty well.

It looks as if 72 blu's car had the seam sealer installed after paint.

The original seam sealer is painted over blue. The Challenger has had some work done on it before I got it, and someone added a crap load of seam sealer to it. But the factory stuff was done before paint and then painted over, just like all of my other cars.

[anlauto]

Actually the black seam sealer on the blue car shown is factory...

My personal theory, based on absolutely nothing...Is that the black sealer, whatever it is, was put on prior to paint yet it absorbed the paint more than the typical off-white sealer used elsewhere, therefore it looks like it was put on after...break it away and you'll find bare metal.

I thought this thread was about the underside of the car being painted? Where's the proof of that ?

[HP2]

The interior of my '74 is all body color. Thin and flat in appearance, but everywhere.

[Moneypit440]

I thought this thread was about the underside of the car being painted? Where's the proof of that ?

That's the question I started the thread with.  I keep seeing undercarriage photos on eBay that match body color, and others that appear black as mine does.  All the floor pan photos seem to show what I had assumed to be a fact-floor pans were painted to match body color. 

[72bluNblu]

 

That's the question I started the thread with.  I keep seeing undercarriage photos on eBay that match body color, and others that appear black as mine does.  All the floor pan photos seem to show what I had assumed to be a fact-floor pans were painted to match body color.

On the inside.

As already stated, underneath the car was NOT painted. At least not purposefully. It was only oversprayed when the outside of the car was painted. On some cars the body color didn't make it much past the rockers. On others, like my EL5 GT, it almost looks like they intended to paint the bottom, the overspray covers almost all the way to the tunnel. But if you look above the rear axle, all that's there is primer.

Cars that have the bottom of the car painted are not factory, and were most likely done on a rotisserie. From the factory all that should be there is a grayish primer and overspray, or black undercoating if the car was optioned with it.

['Cuda Hunter]

If you start here you will find the beginning discussion about undercoating.
It will shed some light on the process of how the factory sprayed the underside of the cars.
A few pages more will show more info on the undercoating and paint.

http://www.cuda-challenger.com/cc/index.php?topic=84614.90

[burdar]

You guys can believe what you want...and I can believe what I want.  Those pictures look like a lot of overspray...not intentional painting to me.  WHY would the factory waist paint and time?  They were about making the most money they could per car.  The entire bottom half of the car was already dipped in primer.  If they thought that was good enough for the exposed underside, why would the interior need more protection?

[Skunkworks Challenger]

I can't vouch for any car but mine, 1970 Challenger RT Los Angles production 12-11-69, was painted top ,bottom ,inside , outside in FJ5.  It was also heavily undercoated afterward  but I'm guessing that was done at a dealer (not sure) but whoever did it must have been getting paid by the pound of material applied.  It was very heavy.  Guess I thought they were all done that way.

I put my car on a rotisserie and removed all the undercoat.  This exposed the "overspray" of FJ5.  I then got out my sand blaster and started removing the FJ5.  As the Fj5 was removed the brownish dip primer appeared.  I continued through the dip primer to bare metal.  Everywhere on the whole body I encountered the same thing except the undercoat was only  underneath.  I'm OK with calling it overspray but it was FJ5 like the rest of the car.  I've done enough restoration work that I know what I'm seeing.  I did all this work myself.   I was the first person to remove the coatings down to bare metal all over.

[72bluNblu]

You guys can believe what you want...and I can believe what I want.  Those pictures look like a lot of overspray...not intentional painting to me.  WHY would the factory waist paint and time?  They were about making the most money they could per car.  The entire bottom half of the car was already dipped in primer.  If they thought that was good enough for the exposed underside, why would the interior need more protection?

You're absolutely right, you can believe anything you want. But as a guy that used to do paint and bodywork, the interior of these cars was not oversprayed, it was intentionally painted. You can't get that kind of coverage with just overspray, not that consistently. I can't tell you why they painted the inside floors, but they did. I can't even tell you why they painted the floors, but didn't paint the bottom of the roof skin. Maybe Ma Mopar had an aversion to painting underneath things. Why did they paint the inside of the trunk and not the bottom of the car? Wasn't for added rust protection.

All I can say is that all 5 of my mopars, which cover 3 body styles, 4 factories, and three different model years had their floors painted on the inside. And all the ones I've seen pictures of were the same way. Can't say that makes it absolute, but I'm pretty darn sure.

[72cudamaan]

The inside of my 72 was definitely painted. All but the roof.

[7212Mopar]

My 73 was factory painted inside complete except the underside of the roof. Some shop that restored Mopars told me the top of the roof will not be painted at the factory if vinyl roof is to be installed. Underside of my car was coated, don't know if painted.

[Tropicalcats]

This is a 70 LA car the inside floor was painted the underside of the roof was not. It had a vinyl top. Not the best picture but you can see the hump and flooris nicely coated. Underside of car was a dark primer