[77 TRASHCAN]

AMX,
Found something interesting, may not help, but.....

Www.autocolorlibrary.com

[AMX guy]

So between the 2 solar golds would you say the ' 78 or the '79 is less brown and more gold ? in the two spray out cards there do you know which one is the lighter color ?

I'm not really trying to match anything, I'm just looking for a gold I like better than Tiger Gold but isn't so far off it jumps at you. I have a box of 1/2 pints I've chosen off the generic RM color cards that look great on the chip but a no go in real life. my car is a special order color car and PHS says there's no way to prove what color it was. I know it was Tiger Gold but I'm half tempted to paint it some other color why I still have some sanity left. this has by far been the biggest PITA I've run into in 40 years of doing this stuff.

[burd]

I’ll post o pic of both in the sun.

[AMX guy]

So for 1980 the notes say solar gold code " 57" is a special formulation for this year. does anyone know if this would be less brown looking than 1978 or 1979 ?

[burd]

Have a few spray outs made

[AMX guy]

Getting close to paint so I'm back on this.

Of the 2 solar gold mixes which one is the brighter gold vs more brownish gold ? '78 or '79 ? or is there enough difference to matter ? my paint shop doesn't have the 2 mixes just one so before I drive 150 miles to see what they can do . if anything.

I did a spray out of 1998 Pontiac sport gold and it pops pretty nice in the sun. slightly more red than it should be but it will work if Solar gold is as brown as it seems to be.

[burd]

They say primer color matters too.
There a Chrysler Gold too that is nice.

[77 TRASHCAN]

primer color REALLY matters with golds and yellows...

[Poncho Dave]

Some of the newer paints are more transparent as they have been in the past. Whenever I test a paint color I do spray outs on a card with different color primers such as white, gray and black. I also place four or five pieces of tape over the cards and remove a piece after each coat. This then shows how many coats are required for adequate coverage. Since you’re more concerned with being light, consider a white sealer. I experience much trouble with pastels and pearls where this type of trial and error is necessary. Just another reason why I love painting black cars.

[burd]

I’ve seen a y88 painted in the Chrysler gold, it’s real nice.

[Steve Barcak]

am following and learning from this thread as I plan to do a Sold Gold paint job is planned soon for my Y88. thanks all for the input

[AMX guy]

I did a couple spray outs of the 79 and the 79 formula and they both look like crap. maybe it's just not what I expected or maybe it's supposed to be brown but I'm not impressed. I'm thinking the 1998 Pontiac Sport Gold is the ticket. not my favorite color but still could pass as original but looks more gold than brown.

What I don't get is I've seen repainted Solar Gold that looks good, I'm thinking they either got lucky or they tweaked the color.

[77 TRASHCAN]

Are you going to use base coat/clear coat??? if so, did the spray outs have clear on them???

Just asking........

Iworked for a school bus dealer from 1998-2012. I met a wholesale paint salesman at a trade show. Nice guy we talked quite a bit. We had him pickup some samples of our paint that we used (special stuff from the bus manufacturer). He was sure they could match it and supply our dealer with some MUCH cheaper high quality paint. It was a good thought while it lasted. His lab guys that were REAL sharp could not create a good enough formula to do the jon. Yellows can be greenish, oranegish, redish, and maybe other shades.

Gold is an equally difficult colr to make happen.

AMCGUY, Steve, I am looking forward to seeing your finished products!!!
Jeff

[Steve Barcak]

With all the discussion on getting a proper shade of this color, etc. Why not just have the paint store color match an original part?
That is what I plan to do- bring a flare or spoiler to them to make sure it matches for my repaint. seems simple and have always painted my own cars. Am I missing something here? let me know before I drop the $$ for the color.

thanks

[Trevor78]

Even the factory offered a variation in mixing the Solar Gold paint in their Notices. Perhaps version 2 was one of these, or another again, to combat issues they had early on.

[burd]

I think I saw a bulletin in 1978 for the problem matching the paint
How do you scan 45 year old paint that is faded ?

[burd]

Here, lol

[Trevor78]

Actually, 2 guys have already mentioned and posted the bulletin for alternative mix, silly posts are showing in wrong order here.

[Trevor78]

Quick dodgy sun photo of the 3 main GM Gold paints samples used in those years.

50, 55, 56.

GM Gold paint sample Solar 50 SE Gold 55 Burnished 56 (1) by Aus78Formula, on Flickr

GM Gold paint sample Solar 50 SE Gold 55 Burnished 56 (2) by Aus78Formula, on Flickr

[Hoodshaker]

Curious which way AMX guy decided to go. I was selling new Pontiacs back in 1998 when Sport Gold Metallic was available for one year only on the new LS1 powered F-bodies. I loved the color enough that I had my '79 repainted in it (cheaply-1 day Paint and Body) I don't think you can go wrong with it unless you're going hard on originality, which doesn't seem to be the case/

My current Solar Gold car was repainted back in 2010 or so by a mouse-house of a "resto" shop I had it at in OC Ca. Long story, but I had no place to work on it at home and it had some rust issues beyond my skills and tools at the time. 2 years of lies later i had to rescue the car and most of it's parts before the shop closed and the owner skipped town.

Fast forward to present day and I've been back on the project for a couple years now and I'm getting to where I want to finish/touchup the paint. My research has led me to believe the following, some of which has been noted in this thread, but I have one additional point i don't think has been detailed out.

1. For 78-81 There were two different Solar Gold paint formulas and two different color order codes-first 50, for 78 and 79, then 57 for 80 and 81
2. As Aus78Formula has noted, code 55 was an accent, not a full body color
3 Now here's the kicker in 1979-color code 50 appears to have have been used for both formulations, the old and the new, with a VIN breakpoint of 9N120872 and under (first formulation)- and 9L125958 and over (new formulation) There's a 5k or so gap there, so perhaps the color was paused for a few weeks for the changeover? That's fairly early in the MY I believe. One source-https://paintref.com/cgi-bin/colorco...r=1979&rows=50

I think we can all see where this added gasoline to the fire...one color code with two different formulations and shades, within the same model year...

My current '79 was built before that, and therefore would have had the original 1978 formulation, I ordered up both formulations and did some spray outs and surprise!-neither one matched, which I chalk up the the mouse-house I referenced above. I've gone back and forth on doing a full repaint in the original proper shade or maybe even doing Sport Gold Metallic from '98 again, but at this time I've decided to what Steve mentioned-bring in a flare to have the (in my case non original) Gold color-matched and do my touchups and blending with that. I'll save a full paint job for another day.