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TR2/3/3A Chassis paint color

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tkohrs

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When I bought my 57 TR-3 40 years ago the chassis was painted black. I am in the midst of a chassis off restoration and I notice that there are spots on the chassis that show it was originally the Winchester blue of the original body color. I am about to ship the chassis off to be sandblasted and wondered what the opinion of this group is as to which color I should repaint it, black or Winchester blue.

The way I see it black makes it easy to pick from a variety of paint sources I am leaning toward going with a marine based paint on the chassis. The Winchester blue will bring me back the original color as built. My intention is to restore this car to concourse condition. The question with that is will I lose scoring points if the chassis is the wrong color?
 
I've heard of chassis painted in various colors, but the vast majority were painted black. You can read through the TRA guidelines I linked to below, but black would be a a safe bet. How would any judge know what the original color was? Or even what the original color of the body was. They are only interested in it being an original color. The judges are used to seeing a black chassis...can't go wrong with that.

https://triumphregister.com/title/
 
Black is boring. If you have a chassis that's known to have been another color, why not go original? At a show, just have a copy of the Judging Standards to wave at the judges when the time comes. IIRC, Piggott's books mention the colored chassis paint as well. BNe sure to take photos of the existing blue paint to help document your car. My '55 TR2 has a black chassis now, but the restoration photos clearly show it to originally have been Signal Red. Wish the guy who restored the car had done the right thing and painted the chassis the proper red.
 
Black is standard, but the painter at the factory would often clean the gun by spraying out his last color. Looking for concours, in your case, I would either go straight black, for which you cannot go wrong...Or, document the blue with pictures and return it to the same condition you found it.

That said, be aware that it is very likely you are only seeing the blue from a later repair overspray. You can tell during the sandblasting. If there is black under the blue...then your frame was black and got oversprayed during a later repair/paint job. If the blue is, indeed, on bare metal, then the factory sprayed the blue, and you can document and duplicate it.
 
If you intend to rebuild the car to concourse conditions you need to get a copy of the TRA judging standards and read it from cover to cover before you do anything else.
 
Thanks for the answers, Another question. The differential (not the axels though) is an orange red color which shows up in some literature as a color that was used on some mechanical parts. I also thought I saw a reference that I can not now find that the 4.1:1 rear ends had the differential painted red (red/orange). Does this ring a bell with anyone else? Or am I imagining things?
 
tkohrs said:
Thanks for the answers, Another question. The differential (not the axels though) is an orange red color which shows up in some literature as a color that was used on some mechanical parts. I also thought I saw a reference that I can not now find that the 4.1:1 rear ends had the differential painted red (red/orange). Does this ring a bell with anyone else? Or am I imagining things?
Click to expand...

As far as I know the differentials and covers were all black. According to Judging Standards, "the external surfaces of the rear brakes, suspension, and axle assemblies were usually painted black".
Tom
 
+1. The diffs were all black, with a smudge of color on the rear cover to tell the ratio. Green was the standard 3.70. I don’t remember the 4.11 color right now (getting old). The color you are describing is “red oxide” anti rust paint, which is a very common primer.

RZ5pk7w.jpg
 
A white spot denoted the 4.1:1 ratio.
 
With Winchester Blue being a rare (1957 only) color and I knew the chassis was originally that color, that would be my choice!
 
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