The 'E' Type Forum

Hi
I’m wanting to buy a suitable quantity of pumpkin coloured paint for my cylinder head. Any suggestions of where to obtain?
I note SCP have 473ml can available but at £167 plus postage to Australia I’ll keep looking.

Cheers
Pete

Hi Peter,

I used OMP high temp. The gold color is perfect for the cylinder head.
Hope you have it in Australia

Mich

Ah Monsieur Mich, he is not looking for Gold - he wants Pumpkin (unless Pumpkin is the same for Gold in French)

Ok Ok Angus, I make a mistake. Read the message too fast and didn't see 61 FF.
Don't you work on my car today ???

I note SNGB have a pumpkin engine enamel aerosol listed but it comes up as a can for brushing @ £127.56 whereas the other colours are actually pictured in aerosol cans @ £23.87. Anyone used this and if so is the colour a good match?

Pete

I had to paint the head twice - special heat resistant paint flaked off despite having followed the instructions.
The second time I used 2pack etch primer (after having had sodablasted the head - again) and standard automotive paint (which I brushed on). You should be able to find the colour code in the factory fit section.

I want to copy Monsieur Mich and use cheapo OMP gold-paint !

Is that OK for a May 1962 car ? Trouble is, the engine is R1995-9 which is October 1961.

Angus will treat us with more respect, Mich, after next Sunday night ................

R1995-9 would most certainly be “pumpkin”
Would raise a few eyebrows on a ‘62 car though.
Do it and give the anoraks something to talk about

Seeing two early S1s parked next to each other it was quite noticeable how different the pumpkin paint was on each of the engines. Which one was correct I've no idea

Geoff

The original cylinder head paint was produced by Bradite and Jaguar records show it was 'Gold'. Those same records do not show a different colour paint used after 1961 - it is recorded as 'Gold' throughout XK150S and 3.8 production. Confusion was caused by Bradite supplying Gold metallic (known as Bradite Old Gold) to Jaguar from late 1961 onwards rather than the flat Gold used previously. The early cars used a non metallic paint and has retrospectively been called 'Pumpkin' by the Americans who know what that vegetable is but a puzzlement to us Brits (we don't have Pumpkins - Turnips, yes). "Gold' is a shade of Orange that is 71% saturated and 81% bright. For reference purposes, Gold has the hex value #CFB53B."


The Bradite company still exists in Wales but I have spoken to them and they no longer have any NOS samples to hand or any knowledge of the paints supplied to Jaguar back in the day.



Even today many paint manufacturers have a flat paint in their range that is called Gold (e.g. Crown has 'Tivoli Gold' trade paint which is very close to the fabled Pumpkin). If we go back to basics and consult the British Standard paint charts in use during the 1950's/1960's we find BS381c-356 'Golden Yellow':



I would suggest that BS381-356 is the correct colour for the cylinder head for the cars in question. The challenge is to find a heat resistant paint in that colour! Bradite do produce a heat resistant paint called 'Fastrac Heat Resist' and it appears to be available in BS381c colours. Contact a Bradite dealer for availability.


BS381 - some history:

Published in 1930, BS381 was the BSI's first colour standard. In fact BS381 was not a co-ordinated range of colours at all but rather a collection of individually specified colours; used for camouflage, identification, signalling and coding systems; by the armed forces and other government departments, public bodies and industry.

In 1948, shortly after the Second World War, BS381 was revised as 'BS381C: Colours for ready mixed paints'. A further revision in 1964, published as Colours for ready mixed paints, was described as "for identification or other technical purposes, or for purposes based on long-established practice". In subsequent years various colours were added in response to the requirements of London Transport and the Ministry of Defence. At one point the standard consisted of 107 colours; however this has now been reduced to 91, in the latest version of BS381C.

Although each colour within the standard has its own number; each also had its own name, used more often in the past than now. These names, often predating the standard and relating to "long-established practice", will strike a chord of nostalgia to anyone who loved Airfix models as a child. Such evocative names include: Oxford Blue, Brunswick Green (often known as British Racing Green), Light Buff, Camouflage Desert Sand, Signal Red, International Orange, and Dark Admiralty Grey.


I will add this to the 'Factory Fit' thread so it can be found easily.

I'm going down Mich's cheapo OMP gold HT paint route ........

But ......... exactly where is painted ?



Is the 1/4" lip below the cam-covers painted, on the outside above the manifolds ?

Should that be left semi-polished/slightly rough, or painted, please ?

PS I was about to do the "valley" completely wrong, see the masking tape, as for some reason I remembered just one of the cars from the Factory Fit where the paint stopped at the head-nut level, so that the vertical walls above the nuts were as-machined and not painted.



Some how this seemed to make production sense in that if the casting were painted before any machining and polishing, then anything that wasn't machined or polished ............. would be painted.

But I can now see that all the others have the whole valley painted, head-nut seats and walls above included.

Alright, Alright - only an hour wasted, I was getting quite good with the masking tape.

Hi Rory...can you please post a photo once you have painted it...would be good to see what OMP gold HT looks like..thanks.. Steve

Only if it looks good, otherwise I might stay anonymous.

Or Mich and I might claim it was an export-finish for France.

Hi Steve,

It's look like this.
Hope it's not a Special French XK serie...





Mich

Thanks Mich.... looks very good......Steve

I used this and it looks just right for a 66 cylinder head:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/E-Tech-Heat- ... 2749.l2649

This is the origin of my doubts.

In the Factory Fit series there is a section relating to

"a totally original and un-restored 1963 OTS #879032 having covered 29k miles and had one owner until 2005 who fastidiously maintained it"

http://forum.etypeuk.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=2006

The pictures begin at #131 out of #284, and show a cylinder head that is unmistakeably not painted any higher than the machined head-nut surfaces.







This is the only example that I can find, amidst admittedly inumerable examples of the contrary.

My own head, pre-rebuild, had those zones painted, albeit somewhat apologetically.



Is that 1963 car in the Factory Fit a freak, and did "fastidiously" maintaining it maybe include re-painting the cylinder head ?

I'm about to pull the trigger (Ed- you mean push the aerosol-can button) on my "Very Rare" 3.8 head-paint finish, as I personally prefer the looks of it, but do need to weigh up the risks of excommunication before I commit.

Hi Rory....usually when painting aluminium you would use an etch primer.....havent seen any mention of it on cylinder head painting.......are these paints ok to use direct....Steve

Hi Steve,

I did not found primer HT so I painted directly .
If you look at the factory fit, when there is some gold paint missing on a cylinder head, there is no trace of some primer but it's thrue that to paint on aluminium you must put a primer or an additive.

Mich