Paint Odd colour

[darkside]

Hi Gray from the North of Boro near the BMW and Audi Garages!

[Mr Chips]

Maybe the difference is especially noticeable on Civics because their owners keep them so clean.

[LoonyJohn]

It might be curse that I work in a car factory, but:

All the steel body panels will be painted at the same time, so should be an even colour. The only thing that I can think of that would affect this is if a panel is hand sprayed, (after a repair, or to build up thin paint or any number of reasons..) which will make the paint darker, or change the 'flip' of the colour. The body paint is a water bourne paint, with a solvent based clearcoat.

The bumpers, and bits of trim that are body coloured, are painted sparately, probably using a solvent bourne paint, with a solvent based clearcoat. Differences in the ovens, or that the front and rear bumper arn't sprayed at the same time could make a bumper look lighter or darker.

The technologies that are used in the types of paint are different on the body to the bumper, but the way they are colour matched isn't.. Any differences in body to bumper colour is probably a quality control issue, and not just because the car has plastic bumpers!

If the difference is severe enough for you to go 'Uggg I don't like that' then your dealer should put it right, and not fob you off with excuses

[mike-d]

I noticed the mismatch between rear bumper and body when I collected my cosmic grey civic 2 years ago. The sales manager then showed me that all the metallics in stock had similar mismatch.
I later spoke to a manaager in a very large body shop and was told it was normal ! - it was the different reaction of the base material eg plastic vs steel. He said that he had it in writing from the paint manufactures that this was the case, so that he could show it to any disatisfied customers.
I still do not understand why Honda alone have been unable to overcome this problem as it doesnt seem noticeable on other makes!
I was concerned that at a later trade in it would be suspected that it had been subject to accident and respray work.

[hondabody]

Hi all

I have just joined this site and saw this thread so Here goes

I work for a Honda approved body repair shop so have had quite a lot of dealings with the colour, the main reason that the bumpers sometimes look off colour to the car is that they are supplied pre-painted even as an aftermarket part, they are sprayed at a different time to the car and particularly with light colours this makes it almost impossible to match tem with the car.

Regards

Andy

[Jack The Lad.]

If it makes anyone feel a bit better, ---
I can see a difference in colour with one of my client's 174k Bentleys.

[Courtman]

My bumpers on my Vivid Blue Civic looked perfect when delivered in June this year. The car has done 5000 miles now, been garaged most of the time and polished once. A work colleague drove into the back of me in a car park recently so I took it to Honda to get the bumper replaced - they told me that they used the same "batch" of paint to respray the bumper.

Now I've got the car back, the bumper is a much brighter blue than the rest of the car. Its especially obvious from certain angles, and looks "blotchy" in places as if its been sprayed unevenly. The garage tell me its normal for differences between plastic and metal, but can't say anything when I point out that the front bumper is a perfect match... The next excuse given is that the rest of the car is older paint and will have faded. However open the boot and you can see the difference in colour between the bumper and the boot pillars - which aren't subject to any light so shouldn't fade! Again, silence from the dealer.

Does anyone think its worth me pursuing the garage about this? I'm already whinging at them on a weekly basis about a VTEC fault (see separate thread). Its a shame because in June this car was perfect, and I wanted to keep it this way just a little bit longer than I managed!

[eyemdee]

Originally Posted by JoeyF

Mine is a Blueish Silver and my rear bumper is darker than the rest of the car, spoke to my dealer and he said this is normal on plastic bumpers I pointed out that the front one was perfect, he went mmmmmm! look at that one over there, and surely enough that rear bumper was darker as well. Couldn't really argue.

Mine is exactly the same - I spotted it immediately when I first looked at the car. It must be a pig of a colour to match if you have a scrape!

[Topcat]

Originally Posted by eyemdee

Mine is exactly the same - I spotted it immediately when I first looked at the car. It must be a pig of a colour to match if you have a scrape!

I have silver and after an idiot in a big van scraped off the corner of my bumper the bodyshop did a fantastic job repairing it, I thought they had put on a new bumper it was so good.