correct argent for 72-74 Challenger tail panel

now you got me thinking. I know, bad!! looking at my 74, and it, as far as I know, also was original. looking at the pic, the center does look darker than the bezels. thats an older pic, and the whole thing was repainted in just light argent, so I cant verify that.

On my car both the center panel and the outer tail lamp bezels looked to be the same color. The center (concave) areas around the tail lights was painted organisol. The picture of the shaker I posted is the closest thing I have seen to the color my tail panel was. If that's right or not I don't know. I have seen Challengers at shows that have the light argent and I really didn't think it looked right. I think I am just going to have the tailpanel painted in dark argent and have the center areas around the tail lights painted black. I'd have to see both light and dark right next to eachother to decide one way or another.

Here is a picture of a car that is at the Nationals almost every year. This car is exactlly like mine except for the engine/trans and wheels. This car looks like it has the light argent on it but it still didn't look 100% right to me.

OK...Now I know we have kind of beaten this thing to death and don't have a definative answer but I have one more question.

I was just told by another member here that neither the light or the dark that is produced now is 100% correct. That being said...Has anyone...or do you think it is possible to...spray the tail panel with the light colored argent and then come back over it with a light misting of the dark argent. That might give a more correct look.

The body shop is sending me three different variations of the A5 paint code for my Challenger so I can OK the one I want. They are also sending me a sample of the dark argent paint.

I talked to them this morning and they are going to do a couple test sprays of the light argent and then mist it with the med/dark argent to see how it comes out. I'll let everyone know how it looks.

You may not realise but AllTrim Plus do this for a living (and I think Mr Belvedere may too, I know he does trim) - and they already gave you the definitive answer.

Go to AllTrims website for info. According to them they have the best match to original (they used to have pretty much the only remaining original tints). Depends on what you are looking for. Concours correct or close enough?

The latter is good enough for me, I went with the Totally Auto spray can, opinion is that it is close.

I don't think we are ever going to know 100% I have seen conflicting information. 72's might have had a black tail panel but I'm not sure. I have a theory but don't know how accurate it is. In 72 the Rallye was its own model. Challenger Rallye's had a VIN that started with JS23. All other Challengers had a VIN that started with JH23. In 73-74 that changed. All Challengers were JH23's and the Rallye was just an available package on the base model. Maybe all Rallye Challengers in 72 had the blacked out tail panel. Then in 73-74 sinse all Challengers were now JH23's...they all got the argent tailpanel. All I know is that my car is a Rallye and it has the argent tail panel with the organisol sprayed around the tail lights just like the picture of the other JA5 Challenger I posted.



Just to let everyone know...the bodyshop played around with the Totally Auto argent paints and came up with something I can live with. The light argent was way too light. The med/dark was way too dark even though that is what the factory says is correct. They ended up spraying a test card with the dark argent and then sprayed the light agrent ontop of the dark. The end result was a color that was a little darker than the light argent. It doesn't look exactly how I would like it but, short of shipping the car to the west coast and having someone else spray the real stuff, I think it will look OK.

Maybe this will shed some light?

http://karstentwele.com/challenger/EXTERIOR/exterior.html