SPI Dark Red - Question for Barry

roger1

roger1

Member
I'm about 99.9% sure right now I am going to choose SPI Dark Red for my '69 GTO convertible project.
Even though I bought this car with all the correct parts to restore to original, I'm doing enough upgrades to it to that it is it a restomod.
The car was originally Liberty Blue and came to me that color with one repaint over the original paint.

A factory red was an option for '69 GTOs called Matador Red WA3921 (called Garnet Red on '69 Chevys). Barry, I saw you say back in 2016 when you were developing your formula for SPI Dark Red, that one of the colors you were looking at for that was Garnet Red.

I'm inevitably going to be asked when I show my car if it is a factory color. So my question to you is whether your Dark Red is close enough to Garnet Red to be able to answer that as yes it is without fibbing?

The answer doesn't influence my decision. Brian sent me color cards and I love the color. My wife does too. At one time I was considering keeping it the original blue but she frowned every time I mentioned that.
 
Just to clarify.
I would never not tell anyone that the car wasn't originally Liberty Blue. So just asking if SPI Dark Red is close enough to Garnet Red to say it's is a factory color that was offered.
 
What I have found with the SPI bases is no one notices things like that after they are done. I painted the Coronet SPI orange thinking it is sort of like Vitamin C orange. The SPI bases are so bloody vibrant that they can never be passed off as "factory". I think the Coronet glowed orange in the dark after I painted it and all you saw was the orange (no black or trim yet). From the photos I have seen here the red does that too. The red and orange will burn your retinas out until you get the detail pieces on to tone it down. That said your car will be like a bug light to people with a SPI base... they will not be able to take their eyes off it and they will say they had a GTO that color because they love it so much. ;)
 
LOL! Thanks Jim. I have no doubt. I've seen some photos of cars on this site of the reds and they look stunning. And photos can't capture it like it seeing it in person I'm sure.
 
Roger, obviously I'm not Barry:) but I've seen a couple of completely 69 camaro's both completely stock concours type restorations in garnet red and those two were different colors. This was at one Show and they were almst side by side which made comparing them easy. One leaned more to the maroon shade and the other was nearly dead on for the SPI dark red. Both claimed to be correct. There is a great deal of variation in colors that are "correct" since lead was phased out of toners. I think you would be safe claiming it's garnet red when needed. Especially if you use a grey sealer. If you have to know for certain, I would do some sprayouts and compare what is "correct" garnet red with the SPI Dark Red and go from there. Only way to really be certain.
 
Thanks Chris.
I was guessing that Barry would probably say something like that too. Kind of hoped it would be an answer like that. I don't have to know for certain. But I think I'm going to get questioned a lot about the color and just didn't want to be misleading. I'll be sure to say where I bought it if they want to know.
Of course I might run across a few purists that will not like the fact I didn't paint it the original Liberty Blue but I have my reasons. I love the Dark Red and my wife does too and she does not like the blue at all. I do like the original blue a lot but really don't want the challenges of painting a dark metallic. And I like to paint with all the panels removed from the body and can't paint everything in the same day doing it that way. I've heard warnings about doing that with a metallic.

Brian sent me 3 sprayout cards. One each over gray, black and red epoxy primer. He said 2 coats of base on each. I couldn't tell the difference between the black and red primer but it was lighter over the gray. I kind of preferred the darker ones. I was thinking at this point I'd use red epoxy for my last coat of primer, sand with 400 and red epoxy again reduced as a sealer before the base. 3 coats of base, then Universal Clear.

Edit:
Brian sent me 4 sprayouts. One over white primer. That was even lighter than gray like you'd expect did not like that near as much. I discounted that one right away and that's why I didn't remember in this post.
 
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I can pretty much picture the color you're going for Roger. With your lighter to medium reds, white primer makes the color pop in a brighter vivid sort of way next to grey primer. With a darker color, light primer just gets away from the intended color. Probably is a little hard to see the difference between red & black primer, though the red primer should give a marginally more vibrant color. I'd agree with your choice.
Not just on resto mod class cars, but stock class show cars frequently use (enhanced) colors similar to the original, but much more appealing looking. An example is a red/ white 3rd gen el camino that use to travel the super chevy show circuit 15 plus years ago. At a glance it reminded you of what a 2 tone 76' may have looked like showroom new, but the brighter/darker red & slightly pearl toned white just plain looked better without giving up that stock look vibe. He also had the factory bench seat padded to resemble buckets, which is where i got the idea for mine. ;)

So take the enhanced color & enjoy. With your bodywork labor applied, a car my age won't pass for a factory original poor fit & finish anyways.
 
Roger, I dont know what to say; I had three different brands of garnet red when I was doing this project.
All three colors were different, and I bought quarts instead of punts as I figured colors are more accurate.
I did not pursue after that.
If any of the chips match or come close it depends what mix your comparing it to.
I just dont know.
 
jlcustomz said:
I can pretty much picture the color you're going for Roger. With your lighter to medium reds, white primer makes the color pop in a brighter vivid sort of way next to grey primer. With a darker color, light primer just gets away from the intended color. Probably is a little hard to see the difference between red & black primer, though the red primer should give a marginally more vibrant color. I'd agree with your choice.
Not just on resto mod class cars, but stock class show cars frequently use (enhanced) colors similar to the original, but much more appealing looking. An example is a red/ white 3rd gen el camino that use to travel the super chevy show circuit 15 plus years ago. At a glance it reminded you of what a 2 tone 76' may have looked like showroom new, but the brighter/darker red & slightly pearl toned white just plain looked better without giving up that stock look vibe. He also had the factory bench seat padded to resemble buckets, which is where i got the idea for mine. ;)
So take the enhanced color & enjoy. With your bodywork labor applied, a car my age won't pass for a factory original poor fit & finish anyways.
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Thanks Joe!
As always, I appreciate your thoughts. I tend to over-think things and this is one of them but I just wanted to be more educated when it comes time to show my car. But, I chose this color even before I bought this car but I did waver a few times on keeping it blue. I bought it from a friend of a friend. I haven't had the courage to tell him yet that I'm not going to keep it the original color. Plus, I had wavered for a while before I recently decided for absolute sure on the Dark Red. He's the kind of guy that still has an emotional attachment to the car even after selling it.
Check out my build thread if you already haven't. The link is in my signature. Day-to-day, it seems like I move pretty slow but I have come a long way in the 10 months I've owned the car.
Still anxious to see that over-the-top El Camino of yours finished!!
Roger
 
Barry said:
Roger, I dont know what to say; I had three different brands of garnet red when I was doing this project.
All three colors were different, and I bought quarts instead of punts as I figured colors are more accurate.
I did not pursue after that.
If any of the chips match or come close it depends what mix your comparing it to.
I just dont know.
Click to expand...
Thank you Barry. Like the answer that Chris gave me, it is very helpful. I didn't know there would be that much variability. This gives me a much better sense of how to answer the questions I will undoubtedly get about it.
 
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