How Common Was It To Paint An Engine Circa 55-58?

I think I'll paint my inline 6 pink. Metallic pink.

 

For real tho... Its a fantastic motor for a custom.. it looks rad,, its reliable and cheap..
Loose the orange and paint it some cool color.. or leave it orange and paint the car flat
black with radials and universal blot pattern steelies painted Chevy orange and a sweet Spider web grille...ya know call it Hell-o-ween --,, you silly emo..

 

LOL! +1 man. Course...I may be biased for the black paint... HA! -GothY-

 

LMAO!

Oh come on now...who wouldn't want a can of krylon "ballet slipper pink" to brighten up their engine bay?

 

The bad new is that it's not going in a custom so it'll still be gay.
The good news is that it's gay and that should suit me fine.

 

Factory colors for small blocks 55 to 60. 265 red 55 and 56, Chartreuse 57. 283 Orange 57 to 60 in cars, Grey in light trucks, Blue green in industrial use.

I have a pink big block in my car, and a yellow one in my truck.

 

Hmm. Good to know!! Thanks.

 

where I lived the deal was to get a small block, install an 097 cam, vette valve covers and paint it Chevy orange--this was about 59-62

 

Then and now I painted my motors with a brush. Maybe a rattle can. Different colors. My Olds was gold. Engines were painted and cars were painted. maybe primer but painted. Not bare metal or rust. paint

 

Yeah there was spray paint in the mid fifties. We used to paint the engines whatever color we thought was cool. All that correct color stuff came with the muscle car people.

 

heh.....do you want to impress that 90%? or the 10% who know that it's a 70s or newer motor?



(damn I love these stupid philosophical discussions)

 

I'd just paint it Chevy Orange. The 307 going in my F-100 is going to be all orange, including the Edelbrock Performer, with gray cast iron manifolds, black oil bath air-cleaner, and the old script valve covers. It may not be traditional or period correct, but I'm just sick of chrome this and that on small blocks. It looks too Muscle Car/Street Rod to me.

A buddy of mine was putting together a engine for his Civic. When it came time to paint everything and dress it up, I encouraged him to paint his block red to match his car, or aluminum to add some contrast and light to the engine comparment. He elected black instead to dissipate heat? I always heard of old timers painting their engines and firewalls bright colors to reflect light, and make detecting oil leaks easier.

 

The 261 that my dad has was painted copper- need to give him a call and find out when he did it and for what car... may have been done in the late 50's early 60's because Jiggs (Grumpy) Jenkins did the head work on it.

Oh, when I finally get a chance to come up and look at the '31 "push and pray" parts, you can pawn that gawsh-aweful ugly '35 grille on me since I KNOW you don't want it!

 

In 1956 Chevy engines were red. One year only.

So paint your motor red if you like.

Eastwood and the tri-five parts houses sell the correct shade. Here is a typical offering.

http://www.cl***icchevy.com/product.asp?pf_id=30-50&dept_id=122

 

Jeffrey,

Found out a little more info for you- my dad painted the 261 engine copper to go into a black '52 Chevrolet coupe in the late 50's... now it WAS his mother's car, but he couldn't help doing a little tasteful customizing (all of his cars got a little touch)! And while it wasn't the NORM, there were some other local guys that were doing it too (Dad used to put some time in at Gene Miller's shop in the Havertown area back then).

Hope this helps, Bill

 

Cool Mac!! Thanks for the heads up. I am pretty dead set on painting the engine red but now I am not sure on the which color red to go with. THe lure of painting the engine the factory '56 Red would be awesome but then again the Dark Maroon-ish red would look even better sitting between black rails and a bright red body.

Thanks everyone!