1971 A65 American spec tank pin stripe colour

[GlennA65]

Morning Folks, I am close to spraying my tank. I have Etruscan Bronze (though it looks more red than the orangey pictures I have seen) but I have been looking through the brochure pictures on this site and elsewhere and I think the pin stripe on the tank is a brighter orange colour. I have read that the A70 had an orange stripe but I'm not sure about the A65 Lightning. If it is Orange does any one know how to source the correct colour? RS paints don't seem to list it.
Thanks in advance.
Glenn

[Spaceman]

Is the tank is to be painted Etruscan Bronze /  Ivory or just the one colour? Most of the examples I can see on the web are two colour with the stripe the same Etruscan Bronze.

[Ian C]

The styling line transfer for the A65 2 1/2 gallon tank, I believe is available from Burton Bike Bits. Try either part no. 60-3330 or 60-3331. HTH

[Allan G]

Hi Glenn,

I'll start by saying that I bought an original tank (and collect a lot of other NOS parts for the purpose of colour matching) albeit in thunderbolt green that I made a lot of notes from before stripping and painting.

If you want to get the colour down exactly, I would recommend buying one of the NOS inner air box covers that are on eBay at the moment and got to a local paint shop and have it colour matched, this is what I have done though I am yet to get it colour matched. The colour does differ slightly from the more orange colour seen on the original marketing spec sheets which is more an orangey-red. A close colour would either be the Vauxhall orange (from memory the code being EBG) and is quite a popular colour used by many other manufacturers or the slightly brighter Valencia Orange from Renault.

The white on these tanks was "white" or brilliant white or what ever you want to call it, but simply without any added pigment, if you go for ivory your going more like the frame colour and it'll look like you have tried to skimp on paint (especially if you have the dove grey frame).

The stripe for all these oif two tone bikes had the tape for the lines. The thunderbolt had black tape, the twin carb bikes (so all of them, not just A70 or Lightning or Firebird) had the reflective tape. I believe Burton Bike Bits still have original ones of these and if you phone them and use the part numbers as ian has given you should find your self in favour.

The painted section had a sharp corner to it, though the tape corner is rounded, something that is missed by most restorers, even SRM don't get this right.

If you want the datum's for the paint I would be happy to give them to you.

I have attached some photos that hopefully might further explain. The orange colour swatch is the EBG

The green I used on mine was Elbait (aka kryptonite) Green from Mercedes, I went for something similar but a little bit brighter.

[Spaceman]

I have used RS Paints for all my BSA restorations and, from speaking to the guy in charge, they use original BSA colour cards to match to and therefore the BSA colours they offer are as authentic as you can get. In terms of the stripe, as far as I can see, they were listed as separate items in the 1972 parts book but are not shown in the 1971 parts book. As said, for 1971 bikes you can see pictures of on the Web, the stripe does look to be the same colour as the rest of the coloured tank and does not look to be reflective although I could be wrong .

[Allan G]

I have used RS Paints for all my BSA restorations and, from speaking to the guy in charge, they use original BSA colour cards to match to and therefore the BSA colours they offer are as authentic as you can get. In terms of the stripe, as far as I can see, they were listed as separate items in the 1972 parts book but are not shown in the 1971 parts book. As said, for 1971 bikes you can see pictures of on the Web, the stripe does look to be the same colour as the rest of the coloured tank and does not look to be reflective although I could be wrong .

You're very wrong. But please don't be offended.

RS are not too bad on some solid colours but the A65 oif colours are certainly off, the colour for the Hondas ... are off, as is the candy red colour for the pre oif. Depending on who you talk to and what day you'll get a different answer on their colours, when I discussed the incorrect Sterling moss green they even apologised and admitted that it was taken from a colour which someone has asked to be colour matched some years ago and they claimed it was sterling moss green. Unless you have a series of panels, I had 5 out of 7 and they were all in a close colour match, even when RS received my panel to be colour matched, the colour matched paint was like Stevie Wonder had done it. 

The 72 bikes came with solid colour tanks, and yes that was for 2 and 4 gallon tanks, but as noted elsewhere, the parts books were made before the models were released and often there were changes made to the production bikes.

If you like I can show the RS reproduction of the Sterling moss green compared to an original panel.

I can also show you the Etruscan bronze panel and a copy of the 1971 BSA Lightning dealer advert/brochure.

[GlennA65]

Wow, thanks guys. Incredibly helpful stuff here. Yes I'm going for the 2 colour option. I have sprayed the frame dove grey and again I got the paint from RS. I have to say it is quite a warm grey and I bought a coil deck in original paint which was much more neutral. I've gone too far now to go back and do it again and actually I've grown to quite like the colour but this experience made me doubt the truth of RS's colours. The Etruscan bronze I have is supplied with a bright white undercoat so I might spray a bit out and see what it's like. It has to be said that as I understand it, BSA's colours were pretty variable anyway especially in those last difficult years.
I know what you mean about the Ivory and the grey and especially as my frame is on the warmer side I will think hard about whether to use a white.
I can't find the tape on Burtons site but I've dropped them a line. Fingers crossed! Does one lacquer over the tape or does it go on top of the lacquer? I've had a quick look and cannot find the Vauxhall EBG, probably looking in the wrong place but yes please Allan I would love any further info you have.
Again thanks to you all for the ideas and many thanks Allan for the pictures

[Spaceman]

I have used RS Paints to respray at least a dozen BSA bikes including OIF bikes using candy colours and never found any reason to complain. Of course, with any paint supplier, the odd mistake can't be totally avoided.

GlennA65, out of interest, what sort of paint is the Etruscan Bronze and is it a candy requiring a specific undercoat?   

[Allan G]

If you're happy with RS, then there is no reason for you not to use them.

Like Glenn I found the dove grey is very milky, I had an exact colour match made up from another supplier and if needed I can give the code for that, but like Glenn I painted my custom made Ikon Dial a rides with the RS dove grey and it does stand out, but since I built them up before I knew, I wasn't going to strip them down again any time soon.

The oif Sterling moss and Etruscan bronze are both metallics.

Glenn, if you let me have your email (I'd advise via a direct message to prevent spammers getting hold of it) I can send some full size copies of any info I have. The resolution that can be uploaded on here is limited to 1000kb. I will still upload to here but the resolution won't be so good.

[GlennA65]

I have used RS Paints to respray at least a dozen BSA bikes including OIF bikes using candy colours and never found any reason to complain. Of course, with any paint supplier, the odd mistake can't be totally avoided.

GlennA65, out of interest, what sort of paint is the Etruscan Bronze and is it a candy requiring a specific undercoat?

Hi Spaceman sorry for the late reply, I've been away.

I'm not sure what candy is but it is a waterbased (I think) metallic and it has been supplied with a water based bright white undercoat. Actually on closer inspection and actually opening the bottle I must say it looks a better colour than I thought. Sorry RS the colour might be OK but I still think the dove grey is off. I'll spray out a test piece in the next few days and post an update.
Cheers Glenn

[Spaceman]

Candy paints basically use a coloured semi-transparent lacquer and rely on a silver or gold metallic undercoat to achieve the full effect. I was just curious as to why a white undercoat was supplied with this paint - I assume this is just an undercoat rather than a primer? If so, the final Etruscan Bronze must rely on the use of the undercoat which could well mean the final colour is slightly different to what you can see in the paint pot??

[GlennA65]

Hi Spaceman, yes the white is not a primer it is required to give the etruscan bronze it's final tone. The Bronze is quite densely coloured but still a bit translucent.
I just sprayed the inner airbox covers as a test. I gave them both 2 coats of the bronze over the white but then had a few splatters on one so I tidied it up and gave it a couple of extra coats. That one is quite a dark colour and the one with 2 coats is brighter but a bit pale. There are also a couple of patches that didn't get quite so much paint and look even paler. So I think I'm going for 3 coats over white which should give the desired effect on the parts that will be seen. I must say the colour is looking pretty good:)

Cheers Glenn

[Spaceman]

It sounds a bit like applying a candy paint where you have to be very careful that you apply a consistent layer of the coloured lacquer to all the parts (tank, mudguards and side panels) - that means the same number of coats and the same amount of paint in each coat. Spraying my A65 Flamboyant Candy Red certainly challenged my paint spraying technique but the final result was very satisfying. Good luck with the Etruscan Bronze

[GlennA65]

Thanks Spaceman, Yes it is a test of consistency. The sample I've done has taught me how to approach it and although it's not yet perfect it will not really be seen. Fingers crossed the rest goes to plan. The test was encouraging though

I did a similar exercise on my Triumph but in hindsight I put a few too many layers on. It looks good but maybe not quite translucent enough. Slowly learning by my mistakes

Cheers Glenn

[Allan G]

I cant remeber if I sent these photos to Glen, but I did post them on Britbike.com 

This is a NOS pannel, the duller image is the ebay image from when I bought it, after a good wash to remove the 50+ years of dust it didn't look too much different on a dull day... but like a lot of the 70's BSA colours, they really do come to life in the sunlight..

As mentioned before.. Neither the green nor the Bronze (Only the 72's were named Eutruscan Bronze and the colour was marginly different - more copper coloured) were candy, nor should they be.

The white supplied was likely for the white portion of the tank...