My painter is taping off the hood and was not sure whether the body paint wraps around the hood and shows at all on the underside, or is the underside completely flat black and the edge of the hood (downward edge) is the end of the body color? So I guess what I am asking is this hood painted correctly assuming its a C2 hood (not sure it is) but you get the jist. The arrow is not pointing to the shadow, I am pointing to the flat area next to the black frame, is that supposed to be body color on a 63?
I could look at pictures of my hood before he stripped it, but my hood has been painted 3 times so I have no idea if the last guy got carried away. In the first case the hood is black and the area around is blue (body color) second picture is a Red car, with a black hood, no overlap in body color. which is correct for a 63?

 

The area your arrow points to should be body color.

 

When it was painted at the factory, the hood was mounted on the car, so the bottom lip toward the nose would not be blacked out, other than overspray. They used a template to cover the body color, so there would not be a sharp tape line. The paint line would have a soft edge to it.

 

Hmmm are these two different answers? Geralds57 are you agreeing or disagreeing with Jim?

 

Agreeing. The outer lip should be body color.

 

So my hood was wrong because it was all black on the underside. I would have never known had the painter not asked. Thanks to you and Jim!

 

the top picture is close to being correct but its not. where the hood curves in at the front the black out DOES not follow the contour, it just fans out

 

Correct. I can take a pic of my 63 hood tomorrow if needed.

 

Noland Adams Restoration and Technical Guide Vol.2 describes it with pictures and text.

 

I must be blind as a bat, the only thing I found was on Page 98 which has to do with the shims/wedges for hood shake. Can you tell what page you saw this info on?
Thanks

 

That would be great, thanks Frankie because to be honest I am not following the fade out at the front explanation. Can't picture it

 

Didn't get back to the forum till late. I will look in my books tomorrow. I have seen it someplace. May have been in the NCRS restorer ?

 

The hood edges were "soft masked" to apply the body color along the underside lip at the front bottom edges, so there isn't a sharp line where the colors transition:


It looks odd to many so they paint the lip body color all the way down....but the factory didn't get overly-concerned with things that weren't looked at too closely. On early cars I'm told the rear hood rubber weatherstripping went 1/3 of the way down on each side (which I think looks odd as hell), later cars (like my May 63) it was only along the rear edge (which is how I did mine)...

 

The factory used a crude mask that covered the inner lip. So neatness does not count

 

Wow, GM obviously figured a nice car can hide anything including shoddy painting....they were right

 

Q/C and standards have came along way in the last 60 years

 

That would drive my ocd crazy!

I think I just discovered why I have never restored a car to factory specs.

 

One of the signs of an original lacquer paint job is orange peel along the bottom, like below the exhaust tips where buffing was light or didn't occur at all. These cars weren't built by robots controlled paint sprayers in cleanrooms...

 

seeing how the factory had a guy one each side you will see differences of coverage's on the bottom of the car, manly the bottoms of the door and the exhaust panels. that is the fun thing to look at on original paint cars

 

Unless you are going for NCRS judging, do it however you like it best. It's your car.