66 Saddle interior pictures?

[Gary Wilkerson]

Can someone post a 66 saddle interior pic? My 66 should be saddle but was changed to black.
I intend on going back to saddle. I have been discouraged however by some of the pics I've seen on the web. The varying shades of brown amaze me.

Gary

[Michael H.]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Gary,

My 66 has saddle interior and you would be amazed at all the different shades of saddle on the different parts. The I.P. panel is a different color than the dash pads on it and the console is different than either of the dash or pad colors. The seats and door trim nearly match but are the only things that are that shade. The carpet was different than the seats and door trim. Soft top hinge covers match nothing and the jack compartment was another unique color.

Most restored cars have nearly everything the same color and it's usually too light, closer to the saddle colors for 65 which are different than 66. The original saddle, or a good reproduction, is highly desireable but too many cars have been restored using interiors of old and the colors just look weak.

Try brushing some brake fluid on a few of the vinyl interior items and see if it makes the dye job crinkle up and fall off. (don't use on any of the painted fiberglass surfaces) May take sitting overnight. You may find that the original saddle vinyl under it is still excellent. What color is the car?

[Gary Wilkerson]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Michael,

Thanks for the response. The exterior color is Milano Maroon with a black soft top.

I was looking at a picture on the web from a site selling a saddle interior 66. It looks just like you describe, many different shades.

Check it out:
http://www.classiccorvettes.com/view...image=Interior

Gary

[Michael H.]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Yep, that's the way a correct saddle interior should look for 66, although I believe the seats should be a bit darker. Most of the reproduction 66 seats, at least as of several years ago, were made to the same color as 65 which was lighter in color than 66. These look to be the 65 color. I don't know if any of the companies make the correct color today but could be. If you look in a 1966 printing of the parts book, you find different part numbers for most of the tan interior vinyl items for 65 and 66. Even the raw tan vinyl yardage that GM sold for 66 at that time was a different color and part number than 65. The part number and color of the saddle soft top changed from 65 to 66.

About 15 years ago, Helene Zasadny and I spent about two months finding and documenting the correct colors for 66 saddle interior. (she also has a maroon/saddle 66) I'm sure she still has every bit of the information from that episode. We learned that even using paint mixing formulas from a 1966 book, several of the colors that the paint store mixed were way off. If I remember correctly, we finally came up with all of the correct colors using several different paint manufacturers mix codes. I believe she's an NCRS member so she shouldn't be difficult to contact. If you can't find an email addy for her, let me know. I may have it here somewhere.

Michael

[Gary Wilkerson]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Thaks Michael,

At least now I know what I'm shotting for. I'll see if I can contact Helene

Cheers,

[Dennis Rosenthal]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Here is an interior pic of my dad's 66 black/tan roadster. it also has many shades of tan in it.

[Gary Wilkerson]

Re: 66 Saddle interior pictures?

Thanks Dennis,

I can not tell from your pic; is the color difference between the center console, dash pads and console center section as pronounced as in the URL I provided?

Your seats look like what I would expect rather than marbled look in the URL

Gary