Would any of you, looking at two equally equiped, equal condition, same color cars, consider one car over the other, based upon the factory they were built?

If so Why?

I have my own ideas, I just wonder if there is a desirability issue for Manufacturing plants.

John

 

I'd say Norwood for the heritage issue, better paint system, etc... In my experiance the Van Nuys cars outnumber the Norwood cars also.

 

mine was made in v-n but due to the new (for 85,i think) more strict epa rules the factory paint job on my car sux, although it is all still there and shiny its because i have garage kept it and cleaned/waxed alot. i dont recall seeing a silver camaro, or actually, any silver gm car of that vintage still running around with the factory paint still on-does anyone have another example? i think that 1985 was the last year silver was factory sprayed on camaros-am i thinking correctly?

 

The Norwood cars had the Best Paint. You can tell a Van Nuys cars by the faded and peeling paint.

 

I completly agree with Drew and Z28DJP1987 on this. My 89 RS had to be repainted too.

 

Norwood. Because of the paint issue and because I like the idea that the car was made "nearby" (well its closer than Cali.) Both my 84 and 83 are/were Norwood cars.

 

Can I vote again?

I just washed the 91 V6 bird, and blew the paint off two more 4" sq. areas... Gets old... the paint just flakes off right down to the primer... Someplace repainted the front end before I bought it, but everything from the doors back the paint is letting go... The spoiler and rear bumper were white when I bought it, the door edge moldings are white on the top half, the mirrors are white, etc etc etc... Forget california and their crap.

 

Drew,
I know this is off topic, but I thought I would share...
What color is your 91 V6? if it is Blue, White or silver/gray, then I might have an explanation for you why this is happening to your paint.

About a year and a half ago, I looked at a 91 Formula that was the darker blue, I already owned a light blue 91 formula, and it had been re-painted in places. But the dark Blue Formula I was looking at was pealing paint like you were saying, from the firewall back.

I went to a buddy's bump shop and asked him why they did that, and his explanation was essentially this. "GM started using a new SEALER for the metal to keep the cars from rusting. It was quite expensive and the paint stuck to it pretty well. So they decided to forget the primer..." this next part is interesting, " He told me that some of the colors like Gray, blue, etc do not need alot of pigment to get a good color coat, and in effect the UV rays would break down the surface of the sealer, then the paint begins to let go because there is nothing to stick to but powder."

Essentially the problem your having is a lack of primer problem, If they simply gave the cars a layer of Primer, they would not have had this problem.

GM had a recall on many cars for that very problem, but it was kind of Hush hush, and it only came about after a news report on something like 20/20 that brought it to light.

The 91 Formula (light blue) car that I owned the bumpers were never re-painted, until I did them, but they did not seem to peal like the metal parts of the car.

Matter of fact the dark blue car I looked at the spoiler was fine, but all of the other panels were flaking off, except in front of the firewall. And that might be explained by the fact that most of the older cars were painted before the front fenders were installed. I am not sure about 3rdgens though...

thought I would share..

John

 

so would the majority agree that most (if not all) cars from ca. had a paint job that was inferior to norwood? i know for sure that when i bought mine off the dealers lot new in santa barbara i wanted an iroc so bad that when i found this and it didnt have the huge add on the dealers were doing to the irocs back then-end of the model year didnt hurt either- i shelled out the 15k even though the paint job then, even new, was laughable-kind of flat\semi-gloss silver. then to get to the point, im wondering if the van nuys owners had similar appearances to mine or were some looking good and some bad? are there any cars with the factory paint from v-n still un-repainted? or without major touch-up? now ya got me wondering.

 

My V6 is the Gray bird in my avatar...

The problems ultimately were due to GM trying to do things cheaper, and trying to meet the California emissions requirments. The Norwood cars got show quality paint jobs, the original parts of my Iroc are shiny with no orange peel or fading... The Van Nuys cars have the peeling clearcoat issues, the flaking paint, etc. This far out it doesn't really matter because any used thirdgen will probably need paint, but the Van Nuys finishes were crap from the get go.

My V6 is a bit weird because it seems it was covered under the recall, but they only repainted the fenders, hood, nose, and front GFX... the result is that now that clear coat is coming off, and undoubtedly the rest of the paint will follow. My plan for the car involves fixing quite a few small dents and door dings, some minor surface rust (from driving it a few days last winter) and repainting the entire car.

 

hi drew-what year is your camaro? my car didnt even get clearcoated-single stage paint, and from what i understand-it was water based and applied with equipment optimized for petroleum derived (high v.o.c.'s) paint. no wonder that they are sub-standard.

 

I totally agree that the Norwood plant was a better plant than Van Nuys as far as the paint issue goes. Although the two '91's that I have owned have have not had any paint problems at all, but that is partly due to the fact that they are always garaged and not out in the elements. GM should have shut down the Van Nuys plant instead of the Norwood plant in '87 but I guess the Van Nuys plant was capable of producing more F-body's faster. Another one of GM's brilliant moves as far as production vs. quality goes.

 

My '89 RS was repainted when it was a year old, under factory warranty. The paint was peeling off the tops of the fenders!! Oh yeah...there was about a 4" long hair stuck in the hood too

I don't know where mine came from, but I guess judging by this I can assume it was a Van Nuys car. Man, they used to have 2 plants for these, and now they can't even keep one open

 

My T/A is a Van Neyes Car that was suposedly repainted under a recall because the Factory clear coat had flaked off the black base coat. The repaint is ok, shiny, but it could be better. I have won awards, but I would like to get it striped & new base/clear finish.

Jay

 

I don't think it really matters, because while Van Nuys paint sucked for a few years, the best thirdgens of all structurally (91-92) were all built there. I think the quality was pretty similar otherwise at both plants, at least I've never heard of any plant related issues, other than paint of course. After all the years that have now passed, just about every thirdgen built either needs or has already gotten a new paintjob, no matter which plant it came from. The exceptions to this of course would be super low milage 100% original cars that have the original paint, and someone wants to preserve but may not be able to no matter how hard they try. But for 99.9% of us I don't think it matters.

I hated seeing both the plants close

 

Norwood Paint 15yrs later.

 

Sweet! I've seen a few real nice Van Nuys bccc paintjobs from the mid-late 80's too. But you got my point

 

Definetly Norwood. For the heritage issue and the fact that I got a chance to tour that facility on June 19, 1987. Great memories!
GM closed the Norwood plant because of it's age. Originally constructed in 1923 as a Fisher body plant. Norwood also had five levels as opposed to Van Nuys two. Rumor has it that the third level of the Norwood plants floor was weak and GM would not allow tour groups in that area of the plant.

 

Another vote for Norwood.

17 year old Norwood paint.

 

Van Nuys paint seems to be ok if you don't leave the car outside... Excessive sun exposure tends to cause problems. Like on my 91 V6 all the upper surfaces are flaked or flaking. There was a 91 Z28 I looked at a couple summers ago all the paint had flaked off the tops of the fender flares, etc...

GM went to BCCC paint on thirdgens sometime between 85-87.. not sure when the exact changeover took place. The earlier cars dont' seem to have the paint problems of the Van Nuys cars.

 

In 87 GM had a new paint process for the cars. Norwood could take advantage of the new paint process and put out some of the best paint jobs. Van Nuys couldn't use the same paint process because of the chemical make-up and their emissions issues, so they used a water based solvent instead of a chemical based. This led to the delamination and the substandard paint quality on many cars. My 87 IROC is a VN car and the paint is still perfect, however, there is a lot of orange peel that makes the car look crappy. No decent body shop wants to touch it for fear that they might aggravate the paint and cause problems. I'm stuck with an 8k mile car with a crappy VN paint job!

 

Norwood paint 18 years later......

(note...the previous owner decided to neglect)




my other 84 sport coupe was also neglected....picture shows PPG Spectra Red paint...applied in 1998.

 

Oh brother, some of you are very opinionated aren't you? I have two 1984 Z28s, one was built at Norwood and the other was built at Van Nuys. Although I can't say which is better, the Norwood car has the peeling and faded paint job. While my red 1984, with it's water based paint, still shines like new (or before I started building up an engine ). Don't believe me, ask those who have seen my car (ie: Kevin91Z, madmax, Lonsal, Evil T/A, etc ... or see my sig for the pic) All I have to do to make it shine is use a cleaner wax and then polish, it shines like new. In fact I have received compliments on my "new" paint job, fortunately it hasn't been repainted.

The reason the newer paint jobs from Van Nuys sucked was because GM didn't want to (literally) throw away millions worth of paint equipment from Norwood. The equipment from Norwood cost way more then the EPA friendly equipment from Van Nuys. The mistake GM (or should I say the bean counters) was that they tried to use the metaillic paint equipment with the water based solutioned paint. Big no-no, the equipment would not function properly and often would not apply the correct amount (mixture) of paint. This happened after 1988 until GM decided to fix this. Which method they used I don't know.

 

newbury park-where- me too. wait a minute though why the "oh brother...." stuff ? anyhow i have a small shop and live in n.p. WHATUP! who are you?:lala:

 

No, it wasn't directed to you.

I work right off of Rancho Conejo Road on Hillcrest, but live in Palmdale. You can see where I work, just passed the exit to Rancho Conejo on the 101 going north, I work at the CONEXANT building.

Hey, we are having a (SC3G) club meeting on Saturday 2/2/2002 at 5pm in Valencia, please join us if possible. Check the Southern California forum for more details and introduce yourself.

 

Yup thats all right. It can't be THAT noticable on your car though, could it??

 

mrz28ho-can you say mitchell road? im a total of 30 seconds from where you work

 

LOL, sent you an email ...

 

Personally I prefer that my car was made in CA and still resides less than 3 miles from where ASC converted it to a convertible. my paint is 80% original. The stock hood & nose were repainted. But the original paint is in better shape than the re-spray.

 

I vote Van Nuys because it was cool driving past that place with the f-bodies on big stands. BTW its better than Canada

 

Ahhhh, that might explain why production when soley to California instead of Ohio. Since ASC was in CA, it would only make sence to have production there than Ohio.

Not all of the puzzle, but just a piece makes it all more clear..

John

 

Van Nuys Paint 13 years later,
AND 13 Canadian winters baby!

Sorry for quality of picture..

 

I vote for Norwood, hands down.. for the paint quality as well as the rarity.. Norwood made half as many cars as VN in 1982. Dunno about other years. my 85 VN firebird started peeling long ago and was repainted "primer ugly" years before I bought it. My 84 S/E is also VN but seems fine, and I think it's the original paint, but no way to tell for sure.. no obvious signs of repaint. Both my VN cars:


20-year old Norwood paint on my 82 T/A: