1937 Packard 120 Chassis Paint

37 PACKARD 120 is in a thousand and one pieces and ready to be put back together. Need some help regarding the frame color and paint scheme. Is the color black and is the finish shiny or satin or flat?

Thank's,

Bob

P.S. Also looking for a set of rust free running boards.

Email: pint4@new.rr.com

Ph: 920-731-8519

Frames were painted with about the cheapest paint available, semi-gloss black.

Hello Bob

If I may comment here I to asked this question of many people. My 1940 chassis was painted using Sherwin Williams ALKYLYD Black my satisfaction was less than I expected and stalled the project for a long time. Too glossy and poor preparation of the rusted areas..

I have tried ALK 200 with flattening powder I haven't quite got formula/gloss I was looking for. I have received several replies to use John Deere semi black. I have used this on several misc. parts I used the rattle can method and found the gloss level to be somewhat close to what I had hoped for. However it seems as if the rattle can method was a thinner coat than hoped for and produced many runs and sometimes not a uniform finish.

My next venture is to use the John Deere brank using the compressor/spray gun effort.

I also have had all of the dismantled parts blasted, and powder coated a commercial black finish however: The same powder coat had different gloss appearance on different metals. EG. Cast Iron, formed heavy steel and formed thin gage metal. Also if the powder coating chips it is difficult to fix, that is when I decided to apply a wet coat for uniformity.

Hopefully this time I will have the success I am looking for.

On a side note it was quite a project getting my running board blasted, repaired and powder coated. That is a story for another time. They need to be prepped to send to Hunley Acuff.

Hope my experience has helped you out.

Fred D

For what it's worth, the toughest flat black paint in the world is a two-part marine urethane called AwlGrip. It IS available in flat black, although it is not easy to find. You also need the reducer and the catalyst. It is not cheap, but I have never seen anything that is as tough as it is. It is also very resistant to UV and heat.

I have used ValSpar satin black polyurethane over epoxy primer and been very happy with the color sheen and durability.

I am not even inclined to experiment with other options.

Bernie

Another alternative, Eastwood sells a very satisfactory semi-gloss black chassis paint.

I disagree with the cheapest paint available theory. I have done several total frame off restorations of Packards, have owned quite a few and done work on many more, including very low mileage originals. I have not seen a Packard with a flat black or semi gloss frame, that hadn't been repainted. Sure the gloss may have dulled over the last 70 years, but when you take pieces off and reveal the original finish which has never seen the light of day, it is glossy. Packard had high standards, even on the juniors, and putting on crappy paint wasn't in the spec book. They cared about paint lasting and I have dealer letters where they took cars back or repainted them because the exterior paint didn't hold up on the early juniors, later letters apologize to the dealers and assure them that the paint quality would be back to what a Packard customer expected. To further test the frame paint, on several cars that had original paint on the frame - including Super 8s, 12s and the 37 120 we are restoring now where the paint was largely covered by a thick coat of Iowa farm road mud which caked in the frame rails, the paint held up well and was definitely gloss. I took some compound and polished it and there is no question. Several frames had paint good enough that the chassis designation stenciled on the frame was still there, including this 120. Gloss paint, be it automotive or house paint, will hold up better than flat paint, due to the hard shell on the outside, and for that reason, it was specified on the frames. If these frames were flat finish, the paint wouldn't have lasted in everyday hard use like the car we are doing now had. If you want to do it right, put a good quality gloss paint on your frame. Also when I have cleaned up these frames, they were well painted, no places were missed and there weren't huge runs in them - it wasn't a quick and dirty job on a Packard. I have also seen a number of Packards which had body color frames, which was definitely gloss and in those cases the paint on the frame looks now to be the same level of gloss that the original black was. I think people get confused because there wasn't underlying surface prep done to give a totally smooth surface to apply the paint to and therefore it doesn't look as good.

Agreed. I think many more frames and chassis parts are painted incorrectly with flat black or semi gloss than the other way round. Admittedly semi gloss hides a lot of ugly. I also blame the marketers of these "frame and chassis paints".

Very interesting, and makes eminent sense. Also interesting in that two-part catalyzed paints probably didn't exist back then, so what they were using were one-part paints- alkyd enamel, I would think.

As I mentioned, the toughest and glossiest paint I know of is AwlGrip, if you are willing to put the effort in to learn how to use it. It can be rolled, brushed or sprayed. It isn't cheap, but it will stand years of exposure to direct sun and keep a gloss. It is also hard as nails, so it will do well on chassis parts.

A friend sent me an excerpt from the 35-37 Packard 120 restoration reference book which states the chassis paint is semi-gloss. Now I wonder if Packard might have done it both ways depending on the year, 35, 36, or 37, or customer preference.

Customer preference? - not likely especially on a production car like the 120; in prior years Packard did offer the option on senior cars of chassis in color, for an extra charge. And I don't believe Packard even painted the regular frames, I would expect they were all painted by the frame manufacturer, A. O. Smith, prior to delivery to Packard. As to different by years - not likely, to my knowledge they were all semi-gloss black except for those rare senior cars with chassis in color which was mostly limited to show cars and custom coachwork cars.

Here is the finish I got on my Buick Riviera frame about 20 years ago: http://brockportinternational.com/xjs/Dir5/Riviera/2011-02-27/008.png

http://brockportinternational.com/xjs/Dir5/Riviera/2011-02-27/012.png

It looks just as good today. I cleaned it thoroughly before taking it to a sand baster. The used a fine media and applied epoxy primer as soon as the blasting was done. When dry they gave it a coat of the Val Spar satin (semi-gloss) urethane that is still available.

I used a closet door shoe rack that still hangs from a rafter in the garage for primering and finishing the small parts with the same technique:

http://brockportinternational.com/xjs/Dir5/Riviera/2011-02-27/013.png

The Valspar has just the right gloss, looks good for inner fender panels and other chassis type areas. I clean it by wiping it with a clean paper towel sprayed with WD-40. I have been doing that for close to 20 years now. We'll see how it works out in the long run.

Bernie

Most gloss chassis paint was alkyd enamel. Long life and easy to use, it can be painted directly over bare etched metal (like production chassis prep) and still have a long service life. I too have removed parts to find a glossy finish below them on black frames. A few years back I finished a 37 12 and it had glossy paint below some parts that were still in place since new. 120 or 12, it's still a Packard built with higher standards than the rest of the industry. The best bet for unimpeachable info is factory photos, especially those taken in the assembly plants. Sometimes you need to temper the use of such info and know what you're looking at. I've seen Packard Green transmissions (engine color) in old factory photos but those were on a show chassis. Sometimes a different color is used to highlight a change too, but if there's assembly line pictures or those in a showroom you can rest assured that you're seeing what the customer was buying.