Your primer is showing!

[mx5er]

Check out the underside of the hood on the Subaru XV:



Yeah, it's one of those boring dealership videos so just skip to 0:44. Normally the underside of a body panel would match the color of the car but without the clear coat. I, personally never seen anything like this before. It looks like the hood was fully closed during painting. So then I skipped over to the part when the guy opens the doors to see if the door jams were fully painted or not. But the jams are fully painted.

I don't know but maybe the painting process at the factory is different with that funky orange? Or the hood was damaged during shipping and a quickie paint job was done at the port?

[worth_fixing]

Yeah, it looks like a real crappy job, like they totally forgot it.

[atomicalex]

That doesn't even look primed.....

Most auto paint shops use a two- or three-wet process now. Primer/color/clear. This looks like the hood was closed for paint, which is very unusual and would have precluded even primer making it on.

Urgh, if that is the bare e-coat, that has a lifetime of weeks. No good. You need some kind of protection over e-coat. :nervous:

[mx5er]

e-coat as in when the bare uni-body is charged (+ or -) then dipped into the vat of e-coat with an opposite charge? Then the body is primed, base coat then clear coat correct?

So with that Subaru, it looks like the hood was closed right after the e-coat, then it was sprayed with primer, then base then clear?

[ATL_Av8r]

weight savings, yo

[horsty69]

The have been taking cues from Chrysler.

[atomicalex]

e-coat as in when the bare uni-body is charged (+ or -) then dipped into the vat of e-coat with an opposite charge? Then the body is primed, base coat then clear coat correct?

So with that Subaru, it looks like the hood was closed right after the e-coat, then it was sprayed with primer, then base then clear?

The hood might not even be on the car for ecoat - sometimes they are done separately.

Ok, in general, what happens is...

Stamping makes the pieces.
Body shop assembles them into a car-shaped thing.
Weld shop welds it up in a unitbody and hangs the doors.
Chassis prep hits it with sound deadening, seam sealer, and other pre-bake stuffs. First surface defect check and repair.
Pretreat phosphates it, ecoats it, and bakes it off. These are bath processes (unitbody goes "under water")
Repair shop checks it for defects, does repairs, and applies any non-bake sealer-type stuff. Doors are propped open for paint.
Paint shop paints it. This is a powder or wet spray process - not "under water".
Then, it's off to final assembly for marriage, interior install, and final tweaks.

[classicjetta]

Doors are propped open for paint.
Paint shop paints it. This is a powder or wet spray process - not "under water".

Anybody know if the Subaru Ota plant paints the cars by hand or by robot? I could see somebody snoozing and just missing it, but if they deliberately were cheap then that's pretty bad.

[BRealistic]

It looks like the entire engine bay area is a different color, which makes me think the bottom of the hood is the same treatment. Maybe some type of thermal reflective coating?

[HwAoRrDk]

Maybe the dealership themselves had it resprayed orange, and the silver isn't un-painted metal but the factory-applied silver/grey colour. I could see how a dealership might want an in-your-face bright colour for their newest display model, rather than something dowdy.

[atomicalex]

Anybody know if the Subaru Ota plant paints the cars by hand or by robot? I could see somebody snoozing and just missing it, but if they deliberately were cheap then that's pretty bad.

I don't think there is a single mass-production shop in the world that paints by hand. Robots are way better.

[cryption]

I hope they resprayed it orange, but even the silver under the hood doesn't look like silver - it kinda looks like drab primer

[BostonB6]

VW has the same issue at times and TSB's say it's normal. Then again, they consider burning a quart of oil every 1000 miles normal too.

5509-03 OCT 09 Body - Underhood Not Painted Body Color
5509-02 SEP 09 Body - Under Hood Paint Doesn't Match Exterior (Canada)

[Numbersix]

Is this a production car? Or one of the pre-production cars they were showing dealers?

[mhjett]

Anybody know if the Subaru Ota plant paints the cars by hand or by robot? I could see somebody snoozing and just missing it, but if they deliberately were cheap then that's pretty bad.

Yep, I highly doubt there's any mass-production car factory that paints by hand. Even Rolls Royce, Ferrari, etc. use robots because you get a much higher quality finish.