The Best Factory Paint Jobs

I've got a blue RX-8 and while I absolutely love the color itself, everyone is correct about the orange peel. It is terrible. Fortunately, the metallic flake in the paint helps to camouflage the OP a little, but it's there. Oh, is it there. Fortunately, I can take solace in the fact that almost every other car on the road today has OP as well.
 
I'm impressed with Honda paint jobs. A chap a work has an S2000 and there is very little if any OP. Don't know if this would be the same for all Hondas?
 
Phil, my Honda van has little OP and my Integra has it in some places but is actually pretty good. My wife's '95 Legend on the other hand is pretty much OP free where the paint is still good. The NSX (any year) has some pretty smooth paint on it. The *new* RL is supposed to utilize a new sanding/polishing method that is supposed to make the paint pretty smooth as well.
 
My experience would say Porsche, Maserati, and Lexus. I had a very, very good paint job on my 1991 Honda Accord as well.



Older Mercedes used to set a very high standard but lately OP has been horrific.



My friend Bob has a restored 1988 Lamborghini Countach Quattrovalve in red and it has an amazing paint job. Very wet and depth out the wazoo.
 
Our '01 Jeep TJ, '99 Ford Super Duty, and '04 Chrysler Sebring all have excessively bad orange peel.



My '95 Lexus barely has any.
 
violentveedub said:
Mazda? Are you guys nuts?



yeah they have some very nice colors i'm a fan of strato blue and the red with the gold metalflake.



however, the OP is HORRIBLE.
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Agreed, at least as far as the 2001 model year goes. Orange peel was just awful on the original Classic Red nonmetallic clearcoat. A quality repaint solved that problem although it seems the new paint seems to chip more easily then the factory paint so now I'm wondering what's worse. :nixweiss :(



I'm liking my Honda's paint. Sunset Orange Pearl is a metallic that doesn't show swirls, spiderwebbing and is much easier to live with than the Mazda's paintjob. Chips are minimal and while there is orange peel it isn't bad. I also was impressed by my '87 CRX's paintjob so maybe Honda is onto something as long as it isn't black (referring to another thread here ;) )
 
My 91 Accord is almost entirely free of orange peel. My wife's 03 Accord has very little on it. They both have quite a bit of depth to them and are relatively durable.
 
I'd have to vote for the S2000... Most of them have really smooth paint jobs. You might be able to lump them in with the NSX since they're supposedly manufactured along side the NSX... At the very least, they're one of the few (only?) Hondas sold here that are still built entirely in Japan.



I was dismayed at the OP on the red Elise I saw at the dealership the other day until I noticed it was a clear bra - apparently factory-installed (or so says the Lotus salesman).
 
Being a mechanic i have seen every different car company have good and bad paint job's, i seen a mustang today with a damn good paint job, very very little orange peel in it. Impressive but the new corvette's are damn horrible, very very bad OP
 
Kool_ZX3 said:
Being a mechanic i have seen every different car company have good and bad paint job's, i seen a mustang today with a damn good paint job, very very little orange peel in it. Impressive but the new corvette's are damn horrible, very very bad OP
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I've never seen a Subaru with a good paint job hehe As much as I love modern scoobs like the 98-01 GC8 2.5RS and Legacy GT's + WRX's and STi's, the paint blows. Orange peel is in full effect on every car and I've seen lots of runs and light spots. Ick.



The paint on my '04 HFP civic Si is pretty decent.
 
It seems that the Japenese cars that are still built in Japan have better paint jobs than the ones being built in the US or Mexico. European cars usually have good PG's. My 1990 Mazda 626 has one of the smoothest paint jobs I have ever seen. When it is all polished and waxed it looks like a show car paint job. It is too bad, however, because in some spots the clear is starting to fail.
 
I was at the Honda dealership the other day getting my van fixed and noticed how nice the paint was on a yellow S2000. I could not see any OP! I wish my van was like that.
 
I think that while some brands in general have beter paint than others, it is the plant wher they wre painted what makes the difference. This explains why some models os a certain make have awful OP while some other models look great......
 
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