Customer said my color match was off, he was right

Had a guy bring his Silverado back last Thursday, said the door I sprayed looked greenish next to the fender. I pulled it outside and damn, he was right. Under the shop lights it looked perfect but in the sun I could see it. Turns out I was using the 2019 formula for his 2021 silver, the tint code shifted that year. Now I double check the year on the paint chips before I even mix, saved me a 200 dollar redo already. Anybody else get burned by the same color code changing between model years?

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the_wade1mo ago

Watching a buddy of mine fight this exact thing with his shop truck a few years back. He sprayed a fender on an old F-150 using the code off the door tag, and it came out looking kinda pink in the afternoon light. Turns out Ford changed the pearl mix halfway through that year, same paint code, totally different base. He had to strip it and redo it twice before he found a forum post about it. Now he keeps a notebook in the booth with every paint code he's ever mixed and the year it changed.

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patricia2621mo ago

Wait, is that really a paint code problem or just a bad mix from whoever mixed his color? I've seen guys blame the code when the real issue is they didn't shake the can enough or used a cheap scale. Ford's not out here secretly changing pearls on the same code without updating anything, that would be a lawsuit machine. Your buddy probably just got a bad batch from his supplier and the forum post gave him an excuse to blame someone else. Honestly, half the color matching battles I've seen are user error, not the factory screwing around.

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