Painting lancias

[lanciageekboy]

I am just curious about paint colors for Lancias. Do most people try to restore to the original color or do some use wilder HotWheels style colors?

I like the original colors but there is a curiosity about wanting to make my Lancia just that little bit more noticable on the street.

Don't worry It'll never get spinners on it's wheels. hee hee hee

[Pope1]

I've seen many attempts to spruce up a Lancia and make it more modern. IMHO, I've yet to see one that really worked and improved the appearance of the car. Make what you will of that.

[Zagato78]

I painted mine with modern scheme. Check it out in the gallery. Zagato78.

Dan

[lanciageekboy]

Zagato I really like your orange and black machine. I found a picture from the seventies of a rally car that was red with blue stripes. I was thinking along that same type of design when I repaint mine.

[Zagato78]

Thanks. I'm fond of it. If nothing else, it's different. When you choose your paint, just have fun with it. As long as it looks good to you, that's what matters most.

Dan

[chrisc]

So what do you think for a colour for my volumex hpe? at the moment its (in a very few spots!) factory silver, and im tempted to keep it that way because it looks... a bit classy :D but, im also tempted to go for a series 70s throwback style of some seriously loud colour... lime green with black viper stripes anyone? hehe

[Zagato78]

I'm still a fan of the 70's lime green! One day I'll have a race car in that color. How about a deep metallic burgandy, tinted windows with new modern design wheels? :D

Lancias have such enduring lines, you can do almost any paint scheme and the car will look great. There was a Beta coupe from the UK with a Ferrari Yellow paint job. That car looked excellent.


Good to hear that fellow owners are rebuilding/updating these great cars.

Dan

[DJ]

There was a nice burgundy-like color in the Beta standard colors. I liked the look of it. Very classy.

[Hamish]

I'd have to say it is down to the individual - fair comment there will always be someone who will harp on about it not being original but who cares :?: If you like it why the hell not :?:
I've seen betas in all sorts of weird colours, but the best was a S1 Beta coupe I saw in the UK this year which was in VW Oak Green Metallic - seriously nice and suited the car beautifully. It was on German plates, but didn't get to meet the owner.
Just make sure all of it is painted the same colour - any car looks well naff with a body one colour and something else when you open the bonnet :roll:

[A1.6HPE]

Black, Black, Black, Black, Black, Black, Black, Black, Black, Black!!

The Abarth team used black HPE VXs with the rear plastic bits painted in Martini stripes and a top box for the 037 and S4 spares.

Mick Jagger said "I see a row of cars and I want them painted black".

Black is black!

My "Bella Lancia" is black (A1.6 HPE)!

HF said "Any colour as long as it is black" (well OK he is not a good example but his initials fit.

Deep and shiny - go for it!!!

OK they are also nice in the gun-metal grey colour.

Leo

[sickchilly]

The Abarth team used black HPE VXs with the rear plastic bits painted in Martini stripes and a top box for the 037 and S4 spares.

Do you have any pictures of that? Beauty shots as well as action track shots?

[Wallace]

But don't get in done in celulose, it chips real easy compaired to acrylic/twin pack !! (spelling ??!)

[A1.6HPE]

Hello sickchilly,
Re: "Do you have any pictures of that? Beauty shots as well as action track shots?"

I do have some pictures from a rally service area. Will scan something and post it up tomorrow. The service crews don't actually compete in the events.

Leo

[chrisc]

sorry, ive had a black one and seeing as I will be doing all the painting prep etc. myself I doubt the panels will be quite as arrow straight as my other one... Although who knows!

http://groups.msn.com/BetaBoyz/myhpevolumexs.msnw?action=ShowPhoto&PhotoID=405

[Shant Fabricatorian]

I'm with Zagato78. If they launched the Beta today it'd look modern. Its looks were a real talking point when it was new, and to be honest it still looks far nicer than most cars these days.

dj, is the burgundy you're talking about similar to amaranth (series 2 FL)?

http://www30.brinkster.com/lanciabe/projects/colour.htm

Never seen it on any other Beta but it's my HPE's colour. It's not so much burgundy as a dark brown, with just a hint of red mixed in - just enough to differentiate it from 'All-aggro brown'. It was resprayed by a previous owner but it was the original colour. I reckon it works really well on the HPE especially, because the slatted black 'blinds' on the C-pillar are still noticeable but blend in more. I think that with a colour like light blue on the HPE, the blinds become 'too' noticeable, as it were. I just prefer them to be a bit more discreet, but that's just me.

Mind you having said that there used to be a Kermit-green series 1 HPE around where I lived and I thought that colour worked really well too. Maybe it's something to do with the shape? :wink:

'Lancia blue' (dark navy blue) works well on pretty much any Lancia I can think of, with the possible exception of the Stratos...

For the Coupe, I'm with Hamish, a dark green metallic works really well. Black is a nice all-purpose colour but gets dirty too easily (although brown is shocking in that respect as well). The light blue which I'm not such a huge fan of on the HPE also works really well on the Coupe IMO.

[A1.6HPE]

Hello Chris,
But, but, but, but, It's gorgeous - look at the shine also. Just take an extra 6 months to get the panels perfect - you'll not regret it.

Pretty please?


Leo

[Otto-valvole-per-tutte]

Just make sure all of it is painted the same colour - any car looks well naff with a body one colour and something else when you open the bonnet :roll:

Hey, don't pick at Neil! He's having a hard enough time with this subject at Integrale Evoforum.

:lol:

[Fingers]

Like Hamish says it's up to the individual, I think the car makes a big difference too. I love the old sports cars with the stripes running down the middle, it looks fantastic, but on the right car. The new Ford Falcons way down here have got a similar paint job and it just looks silly on a big fat four door, and they are big. And yeah Zagato78's coupe looks sh!t hot, I've always thought about doing it to mine

[A1.6HPE]

Hello Chris and Sickchilly,
I have added 3 photos of the Abarth cars. These were on duty supporting the Delta S4s debut on the 1985 RAC Rally in the UK. Henri Toivenen won of course. The final shakedown was done in Scotland when the Lancia team arrived a month early and arranged the use of a forest stage that was not being used in the rally so just about the entire Abarth factory had moved to Scotland. Unfortunately I only found out during the competition.

Sorry the pictures are not great quality. You can tell it was mid-winter.

So it has to be an Abarth Replica Chris!!
Actually a friend used to have a Lord Blu HPE and it always looked good - even when dirty.

photos are in my gallery - search for "Leo" and follow the black car. This link may work:
http://www.lancisti.net/forum/modules.php?set_albumName=albuo16&op=modload&name=gallery&file=index&include=view_album.php

Leo

[chrisc]

Sorry, but imho the large amount of black and the bright colours of the martini stripes just dont mix :) I will be putting together a few photochops of possible paint schemes before I paint the car.

[A1.6HPE]

Huh! I'm away to polish "La Bella Lancia".

Leo

[rossocorsa]

have a look in my album for a choice of original colours, I have more colour cards and will scan and upload if I ever find time

http://www.lancisti.net/forum/modules.php?set_albumName=albun10&op=modload&name=gallery&file=index&include=view_album.php

black looks brilliant on hpes especially with lowered suspension and wider alloys however I've always found it to be too high maintainence shows every mark scuff and scratch and impossible to wash and get smear free in a hard water area wthout polishing every time

[Maigret]

The only problem with black is that the body has to have no blemishes

[SubGothius]

IMHO, and as this thread attests, the most attractive paint color for a Beta depends on which body type you've got! In general, however, I'm inclined towards colors that take on a varying appearance depending on your viewing angle and how the light strikes the body panels (and I'm not even talking about weird candyapple "flip-flop" metalflake whatnots), rather than colors that appear rather uniform across the entire car regardless of light or angle. The more the paint color accentuates the body-sculpting details, the better any Beta will look.

Even a berlina can look attractive if done up right; I find this US-spec Beta sedan (http://home.earthlink.net/~fiatlancia/future/famberlina.jpg), painted a sorta purplish-burgundy wine/eggplant color with dark gray headlight bezels and minimal chrome, considerably more appealing than appalling :D -- indeed, prolly the most attractive berlina I've ever seen (not merely a "beauty from the driver's seat" :wink:).

Beta coupes in my eyes benefit from brighter hues, metallic or solid, befitting the crisp '70s styling of its back half. Zagato78's retina-searing coupe is a perfect example -- dig that neither-red-nor-orange vivid hue that looks either more-red or more-orange on various planes of the body, depending on the light/angle. My Zagato's PO had a '75 coupe on a trailer, fresh from rescue; I'm not sure what color it was before it started sitting out to bake under the hot Nevada sun for a decade+, but it'd taken on a sorta burnished titanium (warmish light gunmetal) cast that I actually found fairly attractive.

For Zagato spiders, nice as the black'n'gold Limited Editions were, IMHO lighter neutral colors (white, silver, gunmetal) tend to accentuate those timeless, shapely Pininfarina-sclupted haunches much better than darker or brighter colors (e.g., black or all-too-common "wannabe Ferrari" red). If I were to repaint my white Zag, the only change I'd make would be doing it in a pearl/metallic white rather than ordinary "appliance white".

For an HPE, the initials say it all -- you'd want a color that says both "high performance" and "executive" in roughly equal proportions. Black, silver, burgundy, and gunmetal have all been mentioned here and photo'd often. However, seeing pics of the late A33 VGK (r.i.p.) and mention of Lancia Blue (dark navy) got me thinking... Mercedes-Benz used to offer a color in the '80s, most often specifically for AMG-tuned models, called Lapis Blue; it was a subtly-metallic dark navy blue that could also look deep violet or black depending on light/angle -- one car mag called it "atomic blueberry" IIRC. I think this could look quite devastating on an HPE; however, much as with black, this rather requires straight and ding-free body panels for best effect.

[Shant Fabricatorian]

Even a berlina can look attractive if done up right; I find this US-spec Beta sedan (http://home.earthlink.net/~fiatlancia/future/famberlina.jpg), painted a sorta purplish-burgundy wine/eggplant color with dark gray headlight bezels and minimal chrome, considerably more appealing than appalling :D -- indeed, prolly the most attractive berlina I've ever seen (not merely a "beauty from the driver's seat" :wink:).

As far as I can tell from the photo that's amaranth, my HPE's colour. Only mine is considerably less sparklingly clean than that one.

[betadude]

Check out my car...

It is painted 1980 Corvette Red.

[AndriyM]

I agree that it is personal choice. I have a series 2 HPE in repair and after Photoshop magic to have a look the car in other colors I have decided to stay with original Lancia silver. It just fits the car - it looks authentic. Any yellow or red makes it a toy. What I will change hopefully is the interior - silver body should perfectly fit red leather seats. :)

PS Inspiration came from these pictures:
http://www.maserati-indy.co.uk/quattroporte/qp-034a.jpg
http://www.maserati-indy.co.uk/quattroporte/daniel-qp-12a.jpg
I also liked this one:
http://www.maserati-indy.co.uk/quattroporte/qp-028a.jpg