Paint: Is this the correct engine color for a Victory Six in 1955?

[Ted Preston]

My 55 Champion coupe has the 185 Victory Six. The engine ate itself recently, so I'll be building a new one, and I decided it's time to restore the original paint scheme under the hood at the same time.

My old block was painted dark blue as shown in the carnage photo below, but there's evidence on some of the other engine parts that shows glossy olive, and some indications of black.

What should a '55 Champion look like under the hood? Photos of the proper colors would be appreciated!

Best Regards,

Ted

[r1lark]

Wow!! "Ate itself" is an understatement!

Any idea of the cause?

[Ted Preston]

Wow!! "Ate itself" is an understatement!

Any idea of the cause?

Not yet. All that carnage happened in the five seconds it took to hit the clutch and stop along the road. When i opened the hood, a three inch section of camshaft was resting next to the driver side engine mount. The oil pan was perforated in at least five places by flying bits of steel.

I will get the engine out soon and see the full effect of the carnage inside.

[9echo]

Please keep us posted, that is a mess.

[Skybolt]

Is this a more common occurrence with a 185 than a 169/170 or just one of those things? As I have seen more problems with the 289's than the 259's. Hence the liking of 259's for longevity. Or is this just a matter of drivers pushing the higher performance engines further?

[Ted Preston]

Wow!! "Ate itself" is an understatement!

Any idea of the cause?

Ultimately, I suspect The cause was being run low on oil one time too many. I found the oil level was very low when I bought the car. It drove beautifully on the test drive, so I bought it any way. I made it about two hundred miles, running beautifully, then something popped and all hell broke loose.

113,000 miles probably didn't help much either.

[nvonada]

I hate to see that. I don't think JB Weld is gonna fix that one. Please post more pictures when you tear into it!

[jclary]

To answer your question, no. The color seems to be too blue. The olive color would be correct. However, in the back of my mind I seem to recall that in 1955 some engines were silver. I have a showroom brochure for my 1955 truck and all the engine blocks are olive-green in the pictures.

One question I have about your little engine hic-cup....How fast were you going? Those little engines are pretty tough, but yours had a pretty violent catastrophic fit! I exploded a Chevy 283 once and it was a very helpless feeling. It was not my car and the owner was sitting in the passenger seat telling me to "kick it!" I did and it blew! I am happy that it was many years ago and there was no such thing as the "Judge Judy" show back then.

[warrlaw1]

LOL, John. I'm a big fan of Judge Judy. She was a family court judge for 30 years and many lawyers and judges could learn alot from just watching her show. I hope Ted gets that 55 running, again. That picture will haunt me.

[Ted Preston]

I was driving around 70 mph when the engine blew. I was on a major interstate highway, and had been driving from 65 to 70 for around 60 milks that morning, with no indication anything was wrong. Whatever broke, it was all over very quickly.

Jclary, thanks for answering my paint question. What color should the bracket for the ignition wires be? How about the intake/exhaust manifold?

[jclary]

I was driving around 70 mph when the engine blew. I was on a major interstate highway, and had been driving from 65 to 70 for around 60 milks that morning, with no indication anything was wrong. Whatever broke, it was all over very quickly.

Jclary, thanks for answering my paint question. What color should the bracket for the ignition wires be? How about the intake/exhaust manifold?

OK Ted, I have the framed showroom brochure in front of me. This is for the 1955 trucks and there are more pictures of the new V8 they were so proud of than the six. The colors show the engine block green from the water pump pulley to the bell housing. The air cleaner, fan, generator, metal wire loom bracket, oil filler cap, and oil filler tube are black. The motor mounts are green. Oddly, the fan belt is red and the spark plug wires are yellow as is the large heavy gauge starter wire.

You have to understand that these brochures are an advertizing sales tool. Like fishing lures...they were made to catch the eye of the buyer more than fish. On both, the "Thrifty" economizer 6, and the 140 HP V8, the fan belts are pictured as bright red. The V8 exhaust, fuel pump, metal gas line and carb are pictured in bright yellow.

The optional "Long life" "Hat type" Fram oil filter picture is not shown in color. However, I have one of these and it had a black "hat" lid. The body of the filer is orange with a Fram decal on the side.

Keep in mind that just because the folks in sales and promotions department wanted to put a gleeful happy face on their products...the reality was (and still is today), that the real world of good business practices, budget constrained production managers, and the poor guy on the floor assembling this stuff, don't always get the memo.

[raprice]

Those 6 cyl engines have a good reputation for reliability. When they were first introduced, before 1940, they had an oil burning problem caused by improper rings. After that was corrected, those engines had a long and successful life. I have the 169 in my '59 Lark and it runs very well.
Rog

[Jim B PEI]

I betcha if it is the wrong colour it was rebuilt at least once by someone who wasn't a 'Studebaker person', and my thinking is, if the colour is that far off, then maybe some of the important things inside weren't done correctly either because they didn't know or didn't care. There are a few Studebaker engine specific things that could be done wrong. I'll let the rebuilding experts chime in. (I'm curious what lead to that catastrophic failure of the camshaft) If Studebaker engines are done right, because of the stouter alloys and forged instead of cast parts, they 'should' last better as long as they have enough oil and water....