Painting Scarlet, The 1963 Karmann Ghia Cabriolet

Here, on this page, the bodywork has all been done and the paint is now applied, illustrated in 17 images. The assembly phase follows this (on a different page).

AT RIGHT: Scarlet in her first new coat of paint.

Presuming you viewed all the images leading to this point, "before", "initial rebirth", and especially if you consider some of the images below, there are quite a few things to notice in the image at right. First, notice the reflection of the flourescent lamp bulbs in the right rear fender panel, just above the tire - they're as straight as you can hope for, especially given the damage in that area. Similarly, the right corner of the engine bay has been reconstructed. And, the big - make that huge! - dent at the top of the rear tip of the right rear fender is virtually perfect (look for the shiny spot above the right tail lamp).

IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT COLORS

In these images about Scarlet, do note all the different shades of red that can be seen. There are several factors for this. Among these are the type and intensity of lighting, the different cameras used and how they react to different lighting levels and different shades, and the fact that red is notorious for fading in odd ways. All of these factors combine to result in you seeing on your screen sometimes very different shades of red, and most often not the color you would see in person.

The Paint

All Karmann Ghias were originally painted with a single-stage paint and yes, it matters very much that you use a single-stage paint if you are painting the vehicle to an original color as otherwise it will never even come close to looking right.

AT RIGHT: Original color brochure for Scarlet.

The challenges are that firstly, there are a decreasing number of single-stage paints on the market today and secondly that in many areas, such as here in Oakland, California, are required to use water soluable paints. Now get this, we humans are basically bags made of water permiable skin filled with water, which means we humans (and many other animals, like our pets!) are basically walking bags of solvent for these materials. And that means we are at great risk from whatever the nasty harmful effects of the paints are. But, this is our present situation, so we deal with it.

There's a great resource here for finding modern paints in VW formulas, but at the time I was looking (and possibly still true today), there weren't any readily available from formula that are water based, as required here (as noted above). I chose PPG brand "Delfleet Essentials" single-stage "ESSS SS" (yes, five S characters) as the paint I would use for a few reasons. First, it's made by a major brand which may bring benefits, such as being well tested. Secondly, it's mass produced so it's very reasonably priced. Thirdly, it's easy to work with. Fourthly, I've used it for a while now and know it's less likely to chip and is overall more durable than many paints I've used in the past - in particular, it's very flexible and won't crack; it's more like a thin coating of plastic than like old school paints which were more like egg-shells. Fifthly, and perhaps most importantly of all, it produces a very good finish appearance that closely matches the original look of the original paints.

As for color, that's a hard thing these days. The very best way - and I have used it myself in the past - is to use factory original mixing materials to make a small batch from the formula and then have it matched in a modern paint system. I did it on Karmann Ghia 1991940, Aerosilver, color L248 as I recall, and it worked perfectly! However, that was over 20 years ago, and those mixing paints are no longer available. Further, Scarlet is Ruby Red, L456. Red is a color category which is notorious for its fading rather quickly, so it's very hard to match reds accurately. But at some point, I got a VERY good sample of original paint which had been protected from fading (by complete exclusion of both light and air) and had it computer matched. I did it for use on a different vehicle, through that process confirmed the color was about as good as anyone could ever get, so I was sure to save the formula. Here's the label from the can showing the formula for this color in this paint system.

ABOVE RIGHT: Scarlet's paint's formula of Ruby Red, L456, as implemented in the PPG Delfleet Essential series Single Stage polyurethane enamel - a water-soluable paint. INRETROSPECT... I think, given the extra orange tint and not enough blue tint, the fellow who helped us obtain this paint match ACTUALLY had a Pelican Red car, and not Ruby Red!

The actual painting process is pretty hard to photograph without special aparatus to protect a camera because the paint booth becomes filled with paint fumes and, generally speaking, settles on everything (though the exhaust fan helps a great deal), because the painter is busy, and because the points of interest are all over the place. So we have to be satisfied with before and after images.

Some of the various bits of painting aparatus are pretty important. There are the all-too obvious items like, say, a paint gun, a place to do the painting, mixing vessels, clean-up supplies, breathing protection for the painter(s), and so forth. However, some items are vital and not so obvious, such as hangars for big parts, like doors, and small parts like hinges. For these, two specially designed hangars are used - look for them in the photographs.

Now, some images of Scarlet in her new Ruby Red dress... ...it should be obvious what the main subjects of the images are, so comments will be limited to pointing out what may not be obvious.

Note the VERY much deeper color here! This just goes to show how misleading unnatural lighting and un-corrected color photography can be!

Also note the fantastic condition of the underside of the nose!

Paint was actually shot through the horn hole to ensure the horn mounting bracket was fully coated.

In this image, the rare beauty of the nose can be seen - sure, in person is truly impressive; the metal is in great condition. This beauty isn't merely filler on the outside!

Here, at the opposite angle...

The right hand side, where the jack goes, did receive quite a bit of work as the "air box" on the outside of the right wheelhouse was, necessarily, replaced.

There are some drips visible just in front of the driver's door - also shown below...

Looking at the inner wheelhouses, it can be seen just how great Scarlet's body is!

The right side is just as good, though it did get some repair as noted above. ...Again, that repair is virtually invisible - it's basically at the jack retaining bracket's mounting point.

The engine bay had several issues. Not only was the entire battery tray area replaced, but there were patches in several places, and the entire right side of the beveled section where the horizontal metal meets the decklid seal groove - including a fair percentage of the seal's groove - was also replaced. In the image at right and the two that follow, the repair is nearly invisible - you only see it if you know exactly where to look and what to look for.

The battery covers the center of the right rectangle, so the lack of indentations matching the left makes no difference once the battery is installed.

Oops! Paint Flaws

The quality of the bodywork all shows up after the paint is applied. And in this case, the workmanship, while not perfect, is remarkably good - even I was amazed. The one problem worth mentioning regarding the paint was that there were a number of drips. These can always be sanded out, but they are time consuming to eliminate.

The rear lid had enough drips on it to warrant significant power sanding and then shooting another coat. The rest were mostly pretty minor but there were several of them - more than usual. In the case of the rear lid, these resulted from an improperly set paint gun, and the rest were caused primarily by insufficient lighting.

Here are the worst of these flaws... ...In these images, it may be hard to see the drips.

UPPER RIGHT: The worst of the worst, the rear lid - a closeup view.

The rest, in no particular order...

AT RIGHT: The front left fender, just in front of the door.

AT RIGHT: The left rocke - look just below the bright dot in the center of the rocker.

I decided that to be extra-supportive of a great paint job, even though the new owner wasn't paying me for it, I laid down a second fairly thick coat - after sanding the whole body, of course! - so that if someone later wants to fix the paint flaws, at least there will be sufficient paint down that there's much less risk of sanding through the paint! For this fact alone, the paint job is WAY better than was paid for!

Scarlet's "before" condition can be found here.

Scarlet's restoration is described here.