By any chance, has anyone here found any paint that is a close match for the blue on the dash & other plastic pieces of a Raven interior?
It's CHARCOAL!!! :hick: It fades to blue, which sucks. I can get the original Ford dye in spray cans for $20 a piece. It matches 100% perfect though and they go a long way, especially if it's the same color. (For example, I changed a Red console to Shadow Blue and it took the whole can. I touched up Layla's Red A-pillars, door sills, kick panels, center console, etc, etc with one can. 3 cans would re-do the entire plastics in the interior including the dash.)
THAT'S supposed to be charcoal? That doesn't sound right...I mean every plastic piece on the interior is that color. I don't see how the A-pillar trim by the headliner could be faded. It's a slate blue color.
Head on over to your local auto paint mixer. They should have a book with paint chips for both the interior and exterior. It you have the equiptment to spray auto paint then you can spray the interior stuff also forget that spray can rip me in the ace because i bought it from the ford man or the like. Go by a qt. You might have to go to an older shop because they don't send much of that older info out to the newer shops. ALso if you have the interior code you should be able to have just about any name brand auto paint mixing make some up for you. If you can try and find an Oreilly's that mixes paint and they shouldbe able to mix it from a code. They might even be and older bought out by oreilly store and kept all there older paint info. I used to help convert other parts stores to Oreilly's and that old paint books always got left at the store. Very hard to come by that information. I worked at one of there paint stores that had books all the way back to the 40's-50's. Thats is where I found my paint code.
Raven was always charcoal with Smoke accents. The edge of the cloth seats faded to a bluish color...but the leather seats never faded and retained their correct Raven Charcoal edges. There are a few people here with the Raven leather option that can provide photos.
That being said...Smoke is code G, Raven Charcoal is code H. As ipsd said, a trip to a local auto paint shop will likely yield paint chip books that can corroborate this information. It is possible to get interior (lacquer) paint put into a spray can for you. Or you can visit http://www.50resto.com for pre-mixed correct interior paint (although I'm not sure if they have either color since Mustangs used Titanium instead of Smoke, and a different shade of charcoal).
The $20 stuff I use is Ford DYE, not paint. It works quite well actually. And yes, if left to sun beat, charcoal fades to a slate blue look.
The stuff we mix is paint but itis so thin that is soaks into the piece not just layer on the top.
So uh where do you get this? I have a tue-tone dash that is Charcoal on top. It has a small (2") crack by the driver's side speaker. I'd like to use one of those repair kits to fix it and then just dye that one spot to match/blend it in.
I only know of 1 place in my whole state, and they're in my town. Pricey even for me! WELL worth it though.
I knew it was around my site somewhere...just for reference, Raven leather seats:
(http://www.coolcats.net/photos/cars/1988/Travis_1168480098/Cougar%202.JPG)
I thought my seats were raven.Perhaps I'm wrong.They are nearly black on the ouside and a greyish material in the middle (cloth seats).
Vinnie, is your car a Sport?
"Raven" is Ford term for really dark grey. It's a charcoal color...it is not black. On cloth seats the effect is nice...until the seats fade to blue (which was, I believe, almost immediately after the car was purchased new). ;)
BTW, I did discover some info in my '86 dealer book. For those that have a dark grey dash top (1985-88), the dark color at the top of the dash...yep, it's listed as Raven.