Identifying a Car's Original Paint Color
Determining the Paint Code for Automotive Touch Ups
Jul 19, 2009
There is a large abundance of colors and shades of automotive paint on the market. Each manufacturer has several shades of colors for each of their models and they change those colors often, sometimes every year.
Each of these colors has been assigned a color code and is very difficult to match without the code. When a consumer wants to get his car painted or touch up paint for the car, he must first find this color code for his vehicle.
The Car's Identification Sticker
Each car comes from the manufacturer with an information sticker that explains a large number of details about the car. This sticker (or metal plate) is completely different from the VIN tag. Very often this sticker is located somewhere easy to access like the inside of the driver's door panel, but depending on the manufacturer and the year that it was made, this sticker could be in a variety of locations such as the trunk, under the hood or in a door jam and occasionally in the glove box.
Automotive paint dealers try to keep up with the locations for these stickers and some of these can be accessed online by car owners that are having difficulty finding their sticker.
Finding the Paint Code on the Information Sticker
At the bottom left side of the sticker just under the bar code there is usually a line that reads "Exterior Paint Colors" and some letters, numbers or a combination of them just above it.
This is the paint code. This is the exact color that the car was painted during it's original build at the manufacturer. As long as the car has not been painted a different color after it's manufacture, this should be the matching color.
What to do With the Paint Code Number
The color code can now be used to buy paint that will match the original paint job. This code can be taken to an automotive paint store and presented to the counter-person or technician to purchase paint, or taken to a body shop for paint matching.
Years, Sun, Weather and Repainting
It should be noted that over the years, paint can fade in the sun and rain so painting a small area with a a tube of new touch-up paint, even if the code is correct, may not exactly match the vehicle. Once the paint has started to fade, the only way to truly fix a scratch and have the paint match would be to have a skilled paint technician repaint part of the car. On occasion these professional may be able to touch up a small area and make the paint color blend in. The other option is to have the entire car repainted.
If the sticker cannot be located, there are websites that are devoted to automotive paint and they provide search options for matching paint based on year, make and model of the vehicle. Using this site can help when a sticker search has been exhausted.
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