The great paint debate

[vuduman67]

It seems alot of people over time have complained about chips and mismatched paint on there new pride and joy so I'm going to try and lend some insight to the painting process. I have 25 years experience in painting so I do have some knowledge of the process. although I by no means know it all or claim to.

1: Mismatched paint on bumpers and spoilers has been a issue with alot of car manufacturers for a long,long time. Causes very from the different materials being sprayed and from the fact that alot of times they are painted at a different place and time from the car body. They are also refinished with a different chemical composition to allow for flexing. Am I excusing it, heck no, it sucks but its not just the Camaro so dont just bash it.

2: The name of the color makes absolutly no difference to the actual color. All car manufacturers have at one time or another listed the name on the window sticker differently than what the name of the color actually is. Sometimes the name will change over time with different model years but the paint formula will actually be the same.

3: Speaking of Paint formulas. To make matters even harder for the autobody repair industry there can actually be different variations of the same paint code. They are called altenates. For example Victory Red has 2 alternates in Dupont. One is listed as Standard and the other is listed as Red to standard.
I have seen some colors have as many as 7 or 8 alternates. UGH!

4: Paint chipping. The new camaro I believe is chipping due to 2 main reasons.
The first one is the design of the car. Anytime you have a flat area aiming at the main direction you are traveling you are going to be more prone to chips.
AKA: the front bumper (Facia) Very flat and not going to deflect the wind so debri just smashes into it.:( Rounded areas deflect the wind so alot of debri gets deflected away. The second reason is the EPA. They are forcing all paint manufacturer to develope paint that is more enviromentally safe. In that process some durabilty can get lost until it is perfected. The process is evolving everyday.

Happy cruisin!