Chassis color on '41 Plymouth

[Deleted]

Question for you MOPAR gurus. What is the correct color for the chassis of a '41 Plymouth? I found a couple of differing opinions when I searched. One, and the one I believe to be correct is a semi-gloss black. The other indicated it should be a flat, gray primer.

Not that it's a really big deal, but I thought I'd at least make an attempt to find out for sure.

[goofy62]

Don't I recall that you were building it as a gasser or the like?

If that's the case, there is no correct color.

You can do it however you like.

Steve

[Deleted]

Yep. You're 100% correct, Steve. It's going to be a gasser, for sure. The whole look I'm going for is a low dollar, garage built, one man hot rod in 1962. I won't say all or even a lot, but several gassers from that era weren't the "complete hot rod" package that big dollar racers brought to the track every weekend. They were low buck, baling wire, scary azz gassers.

The 392 I'm going to put in the car will be a naturally carbureted mill out of a '57 Chrysler. So there wouldn't have been a lot of money in the engine or tranny. Then plain, old steel wheels with a set of slicks and standard street tires on the front will round the package out.

The reason I kind of wanted to be halfway accurate with the chassis color is because a guy racing a gasser like this one back in '62 probably never had the body off or did any real modification to the chassis. Thus, it would probably have still been the color from the factory.

But you're right. I can easily justify painting the chassis any color. I had already decided I'd go with flat black or maybe semi-gloss black if I can't find out for certain what it left the factory with.

[68383]

I can’t say I know for sure, but I’ve got to believe they were painted.

My dad has a 30,000 mile ‘52 Dodge and the floors are solid. I’ve gotta believe Dodge / Chrysler / Plymouth painted them way back in the day.

[Deleted]

I think they did too. I found more references to either black or gray than I did any other color or no paint at all.

[Mr. E]

I believe that the appropriate color should be 20 years of road grime with fresh bare metal where your owner made modifications.

[Deleted]

Dec 27, 2018 11:26:03 GMT -5 Mr. E said:

I believe that the appropriate color should be 20 years of road grime with fresh bare metal where your owner made modifications.

 

[Deleted]

"20 years of road grime" might very well be the appropriate color. I found 2 different '41s that had multiple photos of the chassis. One of them is linked below. Photos of the undercarriage begin at number 83. I see indications of black paint in several places so I'm going to go with either flat or semi-gloss black.


classics.autotrader.com/classic-cars/1941/plymouth/deluxe/101046819