Hey guys, I need your opinions. I’m NOT a third gen guy, but I recently bought a 1986 IROC with 14,400 original miles. I know the car was reprinted sometime before 2005 due to de-lam issues. My car is a Van Nuys car which I hear usually had inferior paint. My question is, is it normal to see the primer like this under the hood? The re-paint was done so beautifully that I find it hard to believe they did this. I can feel the tape lines in the jams and that which were left original. I’m just wondering with Van Nuys cars if the inferior paint included shoddy factory work like this. I know 1980s GM paint in general was junk but this???

 

Some more pics...

 

That looks like buffing compound that someone didn't bother to clean off. Some of that stuff gets pretty hard if it's not washed off right afterwards and can take hard scrubbing to remove later.

 

I second Aaron, looks like buffing compound. Best thing to do to get it off is to get some new compound and spread a thin layer over the top and let it sit for a few minutes (dont let it dry out) and then hand polish it off. That should take care of that. there is nothing in those photos that would lead me to believe that this thing is delaminating. As far as the cowl goes that looks pretty original to me, but i am not a third Gen expert.

 

Aside from a bit too much overspray on the spring and latch, it looks pretty typical. GM painted the edges of the hood, but not the area that would be covered by the hood liner. Usually the underside of the hood and under the car will be gray E-coat with body color overspray.

 

Beautiful car. My car had the same look under the hood and it was original paint(though in terrible condition)

 

Looks normal. A friend who worked at Van Nuys said the surface is not a class A finish, and why it's primer with a skim coat at best, and not buffed or otherwise finished. Terrible, I know.

 

Thanks everyone for your feedback. I spent time really looking under the hood this afternoon and yes, this is original shoddy GM 1980s finish. I had a couple ultra low mile Monte Carlo SS’s, an 86 with 21K miles and an 88 with 11k miles. Both had original pint and they were NOT finished anywhere near as sloppy as these cars. However, MC SS’s were still being painted in lacquer even in 1988!