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Can anyone explain the Mercury Metallic color phenomenon?
One thing I've noticed in pictures while shopping for a 430 is (sometimes) it appears the merc metallic color on the front and rear doors does not blend/match (in my opinion). Am I hallucinating or did I miss something in my searches about why this pops (or seems to) in some pictures?
I've used different monitors, etc. I'm wondering if it's something as simple as a camera setting or lighting, but it seems to really jump out at me:
I've also seen this on a a car in our parking lot.. not mine... and wondered also.
First guess is the door had been repainted.. it's that far off.
I think I've seen this on my own LS, but have not really studied it that much, but like you, I've noticed it.
My car looks exactly the same with the passenger front fender. I always assume it was repainted but I wasn't able to detect any bondo and the fender's vin# matches the car.
It does look like the paint does not match exactly.
When I was rear ended in a parking lot, after only 4 days of ownership, I had to get a new rear bumper, a little work on the trunk and a new tail light, few sensors, and some bracing supports. Turned out to be $6500 plus $1000 in depreciation. Kind of nutty. But you can see the paint is perfect. You can't tell the difference under any lighting.
It does look like the paint does not match exactly.
When I was rear ended in a parking lot, after only 4 days of ownership, I had to get a new rear bumper, a little work on the trunk and a new tail light, few sensors, and some bracing supports. Turned out to be $6500 plus $1000 in depreciation. Kind of nutty. But you can see the paint is perfect. You can't tell the difference under any lighting.
Looks like a good repair and paint match.....plus, you got to wipe the dealer sticker off (awesome)
Looks like a good repair and paint match.....plus, you got to wipe the dealer sticker off (awesome)
:-)
Yeah, it's nice to have the logo off the trunk but I would have rather removed it myself vs the car now having an accident report and loosing a grand in value because of that. I did also find the best shop that works on high end vehicles. One of the tricks to the paint matching, I am told, is the blending they do. I don't know how far he blended above the bumped but I am truly impressed. Nice to get all OEM parts too.
Its most likely due to a repaint. Silver is a tough color to match and that is why good body shops blend the color in over a wide area with the edges feathered into the old paint. Then all the panels that were painted with the color are clear coated.
The situation you see is the door was the only panel painted. While you see this all the time, its not the correct way to repaint corrected panels. Sorry, but someone took a short cut and saved $$$...
Its most likely due to a repaint. Silver is a tough color to match and that is why good body shops blend the color in over a wide area with the edges feathered into the old paint. Then all the panels that were painted with the color are clear coated.
The situation you see is the door was the only panel painted. While you see this all the time, its not the correct way to repaint corrected panels. Sorry, but someone took a short cut and saved $$$...
But sooo many. I can't believe (maybe I should believe) so many have had paint work.
But yeah, it definitely throws a flag. Thanks Galco
Many times the dealer selling the used car will do a quick and dirty paint job on the front part of the car to get rid of rock chips on the hood and bumper, etc.
Secondarily, it could be from accident damage, but fixed by replacing the entire door from another car painted the same color (from a salvage yard) which has weathered differently (parked inside vs out, etc). My wife's track car got hit in the rear door and we did exactly that. Same color OEM paint but same sort of color mismatch.
Might check if there is a VIN tag on that door to see if it matches the rest of the car.
That's why they have to blend it. You have to repaint areas that are not damaged to get that perfect match. It's an art form. I really thought I would be able to tell on my car. It matches perfectly.
If you guys have a good detailer in your area that does paint corrections, odds are, they have a tool called a "paint thickness gauge" PTG for short. If you can find someone that has this, they can easily tell if some panels were repainted.
On average, OEM paintjobs on regular production cars (excluding exotics) read between 4-7mils, with 7 being on the really THICK side. If it's a repaint, odds are that panel will read a much higher number like 11-12 or something completely abnormal like 15-30 if filler was used. Likewise, if the panel was completely replaced, it often ends up reading a lower number than factory paint from what I have seen.
You can buy a cheap, good PTG for about 200-300 dollars but it will only read metal surfaces so it would be useless for measusing those lower plastic panels on the LS. A PTG that reads plastic and metal and has the ability to break down the paint layers into separate readings can costs several thousand dollars.
08-28-14, 06:12 AM
Can anyone explain the Mercury Metallic color phenomenon?
