What shade of silver was used on both petrol and oil tanks for this year.
Is the colour still available (modern equivelent or modern). Can anyone advise name or number of paint and manufacturer.
Ken McIntosh
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Manx paint colour
The original silver used on Manx Nortons most closely matches 'silver base'.(This is the base paint that is tinted to match other colours of silver).
The size of the silver powder used in the paint has a major effect on the colour. If the 'sparkle' is too small, the paint looks like 'moulded plastic' and will be very 'white'.
If the 'sparkle' is too coarse, the paint will look much darker, will highlight any hollows and starts to look like 'metalflake'.
The original paint had no clear coating, so was quite 'flat'. It was very prone to staining from fuel or oil.
Our tanks are all clear coated, so the transfers and stripes are protected. Some paint jobs are now 15 years old, and still look good.