1931 Cadillac Top Color

[Guest TedR]

I have a build sheet for a 1931 Cadillac V8 Roadster. The top is listed as Burbank. Does any one know what that color is?

[Restorer32]

Burbank may have been the material the top was made of rather than the color.

[edinmass]

1926 TO 1942 brought a re-emergence of three-ply cloth top materials. In addition to these rubber-combined varieties, uncoated Burbank canvas from England was used for top material on many higher priced, open and convertible cars until the mid 1930s. Advances in textile dyes enabled the use of more varied colors. Yarn-dyed cloth was popular through the mid-thirties, then giving way to solid colors. Car body styling governed the kinds of top material used. Surface-coated fabrics were used for lower priced soft tops and for covering the center deck of closed body tops. The latter application vanished with the advent of all-steel tops in the mid-1930s. For traditional black top-decking, a rubber-faced 4 ply fabric was specified by many car makers. If the top deck was to be painted (matching the car body), pyroxylin was used. Ford, and perhaps a few other makers, offered deck material featuring a print pattern on pyroxylin.

Go to Haartz.com I have owned quite a few 31 V-8 Caddys if you need any other help. Ed

[Guest TedR]

Very helpful thank you.