So, I just acquired a complete 69 Bonneville drivers taillight assembly and noticed something I never had seen. On the inside of the bezel lip it is painted argent silver. Is this correct or maybe a factory variation or not correct?
-- Edited by gtodrive on Sunday 14th of August 2022 05:35:20 AM
All 69 Tail light bezels had the inner area painted with a silver grey during early production and a darker grey on late production (the one in your picture is a late production unit). This inner paint seemed to peel and fade away faster than the matt black on the outer portion of the bezel. The switchover to the darker color seemed to have happened very late in the model year or maybe even only on replacement parts. I have never seen the darker version like in your picture on a car but I have seen and bought some NOS. The lighter color ones like in my picture is almost identical to krylon dull aluminum which is what I use to refresh them.
Note even the later cars that had the darker colored grilles still all seemed to have had the brighter silver on the tail light bezels.
Also if you are buying tail light lenses be aware that there were two versions, the early style is like the one in my above picture but mid year they added a lip along the bottom of the lens like on this green car...
All these variations in bezels and lenses occurred on both the short and long versions of the tail lights.
-- Edited by North on Monday 15th of August 2022 06:57:47 PM
Thanks for the information, John! I guess that I never really noticed it on any of the cars I have owned, mostly Catalinas. Guess it was either faded, worn off, or removed from previous owners. I learned something new! Guess I have a little paint work to do on mine! Thanks again for the info!
Thanks again for the info!