Anyone notice frankf's '72 Comet has a original black engine bay? My '72 is body color... The key is no doubt in the VIN, as his is a relatively uncommon Dearborn build that also built Mustangs and(I believe) painted those bays black... Nothing but black in this bay...
The 71 Grabber I was building before this also had an original black engine bay..... That car was originally a Grabber Blue car that had been painted yellow at one time..... It was yellow when the kid I got it from bought it and they repainted Grabber Blue..... Nobody ever stripped the car when they painted it..... The engine had some crappy rattle can black on it when I got it..... When I stripped it there was yellow under that black and it was black under the yellow, then bare metal.....
IIRC, Dan Hines had a Factory assembly manual and there was an update in January 1971 that detailed the engine bays as body-colour. My 71 was built in early october 1970 and had yellow up to the rear of the shock towers with black over it. The five heater box nuts showed yellow on the firewall when I removed them.
Dearborn assembly to Home Office.... Uhhh, gee we didn't get that update... No doubt the assembly plant's paint setup would have a bearing on how actual painting was done... Seen same with Fairlane & Torino from San Jose Assembly that the under hood cowl sections were painted black vs body color from the three other plants that produced those cars...
The earliest Mavericks (and Comets) had black engine compartments just like Mustangs. Sometime in late '71 they were leaving them body-color. I assume because it was less work and less expensive.
Maybe Frank can post the build date of his car?? I'm betting it's around March of '72... I'd like to see a few others posted as well, will prove or disprove it's the Dearborn assembly plant that differs from the others(which I'm already 99.9% sure)... As I stated prior I've seen differences in paint on Torino cowls from different plants...
http://mmb.maverick.to/threads/maverick-assembly-manual.92603/#post-945688 I got my dates a little mixed up. They were apparently still painting the 71 engine compartments black in at least July 1970, but by the time January rolled around (per dmhines' build-date of Jan 1971) they were body colour. http://mmb.maverick.to/threads/correct-engine-compartment-color.39907/#post-400831 I have seen another 71 like mine, but with body colour in the engine compartment, and it does not appear to have been modified. http://mmb.maverick.to/threads/71-grabber-for-sale.103629/
Thanks Frank!! April '72 is certainly later than was generally believed... Now we need a couple later Dearborn '72 to see if they continued the black engine bays... Also I'd like to see some '73 models... I did check the Dearborn builds in Paul's VIN thread but didn't find any pictures... The ones in ebay listings pictures were deleted...
