1955 100-4 Engine Paint

[TodE]

I have read all the Restoration books (Moment and Anderson, Bill Piggott's and others) it seems that accepted engine color is the silver metalic (Healey green) paint, but as I restore my car it seems as the engine paint is a "Army or olive green" (dark green). Not to say that someone could have resprayed the engine, but the engine mounts and areas where it would be hard to get at, are this dark green color. I like the Healey green better, but I want to be correct. So what does concours look for and what is the accepted color.
Thank you!

 

[Healey 100]

Maybe you have a 100S engine, seems to me they were olive green.

Seriously, If you're interested in being judged concours, paint it as per the concours guidlines, these have become the de facto standard -- even though there are Healey's that were probably built with variations of one type or another. This was a low production car and the production controls varied.

I just repainted my 100 engine, it was various colors thru its life -- but I did find some of that original metallic green around the engine mounts. If your car was originally olive green for some reason, you might have to prove that to concours judge who has read the book! Then again, if you aren't going to be concours judged and you think olive green was the original color, go with it. It will make a great story about your car -- like the time the Healey factory was about to close for lack of engine paint, but the Healey family saved the day with a few gallons of military surplus paint.....

 

[zblu]

And my BN1 (No 860) came with a red painted rocker cover similar to NOJ 392?, (owned it since 1970, gonna catch you yet pan!), yet its judged as a non standard color, go figure!

 

[glemon]

Hasn't there been some speculation that the early engines were a darker green than the later cars, also some variation in tone and tint over the production run certainly.

When I repainted my 100 engine with the Moss paint it was definitely a lighter green that had been on it before, but it had also already been rebuilt at least once, so who knows if what was on before was original.

Greg

 

[Pizzi348]

Can you re-paint the engine with it still in the car?

 

[Dave Russell]

When I rebuilt my BN2 engine, which was factory original, there was ample evidence that the entire inside of the crankcase was painted with a reddish "Glyptal" type paint. This is often done to seal the metal pores. See pic of the original interior before hot tanking. Orange now turned brown but still intact. Also a pic of repainting the interior after block cleaning.

The outside of the block also showed this same undercoat beneath the metallic green final paint. If you look at an original engine carefully, there will be reddish orange spots where the factory original metallic green did not cover the red.
D
A few more pics here:
https://www.britishcarforum.com/bcforum/ubbthreads.php/topics/272723/1

 

[TodE]

Dave,

Did you use Bill Hirsh paint on your engine or Dr. Finspanner's witches brew? Looke great! Also spray or brush??

Thanks,

 

[longbridgehealey]

Drfinespanners stuff is great!

 

[Dave Russell]

The Glyptal was brushed. The exterior is Moss spray can. As with all metallic paints, light, dry, spray coats give a light color. Heavy wet coats give a darker color.
D