It really feels amazing to be nearing such a choice as the exterior colors for Lil' Queeny. That will be the subject of today's post.
And there are so many choices! Is this part of the project more of a restoration? Or is this where "modification" kicks in?
I've always been an OEM kind of guy. It's a general predisposition, but reinforced by one of my favorite and most influential teachers - my High School Auto Mechanics Instructor. That was probably the ONE class (well two - a Junior year single period, and a Senior year three period vocational course, because it consisted of the first period in the classroom, and the next two in the shop) that I took in High School which has saved me the most money over the years, but helped bring about the most busted knuckles too.
So while looking through the original sales brochure that came with our first donor camper, and seeing that cover shot...
And then finding Lil' Queeny in those very colors!
And even this morning - I found this online from the Winnebago 1968 full lineup.
Third photo down.AND the fact that the choice would go nicely with my truck... well it was almost a no-brainer to go original and I never really gave it much thought - until now.
Upon deciding the other day to go with the Diamond Vogel brand 100% acrylic-binder water-based coat-all Finium product - still the name I might give our next dog, I walked over to their color palette wall and held my scrap-metal sheet up to pick out these two.
And they just felt bland. I held them against the sample metal in outside light and discovered the tone in red-circled pen to be the closest to the original gold in direct sunlight, while the other two in black pen were closer while viewed at a different angle. None were just like the truck, it felt darker, believe it or not.
And with Finium coming in gallons for the smallest amount, I wanted to be able to use the remainder on something. Not Lil' Willy - as joked about before. He's always been my Lil' blue Willy and he'll always BE my Lil' blue Willy. And I just wasn't sure gold would work right on his trailer either.
But what other color would work? Could I bring myself to customize? Of course I could! This was MY project! I could choose whatever I wanted.
Okay let's see (this is the organizer in me), there's the primary colors: red, yellow and blue. Black is out and so is white, I mean as the secondary color band. Red! uhhhh, hmmmm, well you know, that's not really the kind of people we are, and blue? Yeah, I love blues! But they have to be the right blue on the right things to really work - like Lil' Willy - and 1968 Camaros... No, I don't think Lil' Queeny needs any blue. Yellow? Yeah that's more like it, but it has to be muted and earthy, not a Smiley face Jeep yellow in THIS case. Okay might come back to that, and that's what the gold is, really.
What about the secondaries: purple, orange and green. Greens are great! And Lil' Queeny has interior greens, like the avocado range (but we're changing the name to sage to keep in fitting with the whole Wyoming theme). Might come back to a green. Purple? Naw. Orange? Naw.
And the extra will go on Lil' Willy's trailer. I didn't want black on that - too hot in the sun. I tried white once and really disliked white on a trailer. To be frank, I am kind of having a hard time seeing that trailer in anything other than it's original red - as oxidized to orangish. And the statement is pretty cool too, red, white and blue! (Lil' Willy is pretty patriotic, what with his military heritage and all).
I went back into the old photo archives.
What kind of red could I use that would work on both?
And I thought about Lil' Queeny's own Gypsy sort of heritage and I searched gypsy colors online and there were lots of red and purple tones, none of which I really liked - except maybe crimson! Might crimson work? It's not maroon (I really dislike maroon). It's no-where near pink and while close to purple it's really not purple. It's not "in-your-face candy-apple-red", (not that there's anything WRONG with that - but there's a time and a place). Hmmm, Lil' Willy will still probably lose his top someday and the replacements are only available in black and that means he'd have to lighten a little in his blue as it becomes the contrasting lighter color. Crimson, black and medium blue? Hmmmm. :/
Then I tried to name the red tone for a Wyoming connection, as we're doing for all of our color choices, just because we can.
And I looked back into some more photo archives and I re-found this one.
And once again I fell in love.
This is a Ford restored, original "White" (manufacturer name - not color) Jammer bus, one of several being used today in Glacier National Park for tours on "Going To The Sun Road". I have a real love for these things, and for the Yellowstone Park version in (you guessed it) yellow!
But why are they red? What is that red? I went searching. The buses are colored for the ripe Mountain Ash berry found growing wild in the park! Perfect! Those grow around here too! We can name that color on Lil' Queeny "Mountain Ash berry". And do the Travel Queen logos in the same color (those were originally very close to that tone), and with the new clearance lights and tail/stop lights? That would be sweet!
I broke the news to DW. (She hates red). But especially after she realized I was talking about the color band and not the whole camper, her look of disgust faded and she became supportive.
Alright - decided.
We slept on it and I thought about it through the next day. And after I'd had about 24 hours to entertain the idea, I'd had my fun and concluded this just wasn't the right choice. Red tail lights and logos are one thing, but the color band? The two tone effect? In red for this outfit. No - that dog don't hunt.
What else? I looked again at the store color samples and again they felt bland. I wanted something special, but with an understatement (as my inner Christopher came out). And I pulled this can back out from under the bench.
Here's that Rustoleum thing again.
I like the hammered finish. Along with the right white, that might be kind of cool. I didn't want the copper (although I considered it) or the black or silver. Brown was too dark, as was the Oil-Rubbed Bronze. All available in the hammered.
I had bought this can of "Chestnut" recently when I had been re-furbishing Lil' Willy's heater housing and had been considering a new finish, closer to the original Harrison Heater hammered Tan, but went back to black as I had done years ago, because it just works better on Lil' Willy.
Might this work? Prasma Bob said it would probably lift that non-OEM white. But the side bands had never had the white on them, just the gold. Prasma Bob thinks it was anodized. That's a chemical coloring process that I know little about, but it has something to do with table salt - or is that iodized?
And the color band pieces on the back-wall were white, but from access door metal and probably not the non-OEM white found elsewhere on Lil' Queeny. Only the V-nose had that. And if it was problematic, I could SAND that stuff off completely.
I tried it out on several scrap pieces, some with access door white and some with non-OEM white. And I did no further surface prep, just to give it the best chance at failure. It didn't fail. Even on the non-OEM white.
I liked it!
And how would that look with the truck?
I also looked for this stuff in quarts, so I could practice with my sprayer. It wasn't found at any of the three home-centers. Nor was the Chestnut in spray cans! They can't stock EVERYthing. So it was back over to Walmart to get a total of three cans of this stuff, but while at the home center I picked up three cans of Rustoleum self-etching primer for the prep coat.
This is something that came up in my "how to paint aluminum" research before the professionals gave me several OTHER (sometimes conflicting) options. I probably didn't absolutely need a self-etcher, as I had done the sanding, but I still thought it the best available choice, and I wanted a good primer base for this application.
I tried it out on several surfaces (bare aluminum, old-painted, fresh painted, etc.).
And what about a clear coat? Especially that front V-nose was susceptible to the ever-present mosquito splats, and road tar and flying rocks and future scrubbings.
I tried some stuff DW had (two types) and chose this one after finding it was compatible (didn't mess up the underlying hammered finish, fresh 30 minutes old, or several days old).
I suppose we could get TWO dogs. Finium and Rustoleum. Yeah - that's the ticket!
Alrighty then, let's get this baby masked.
And just for kicks. Someone here who is good with Photoshop (that wouldn't be me) might take the upper pictures of the Jammer bus and the truck and camper, and place appropriate color bands in the Mountain Ash berry red. Then we'd all know if my choice against red was good or bad. :)
