1967 Camaro assembly line

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by Pro Stock John

How did painting cars on the line work?

Would there be a grouping of cars by color, paint them in a series, clean the guns and then spray the next group?

Depends.

There could be groupings of cars (ie, several red cars in a row), but it kind of depended on the plant management philosophy, and union appetite.

That is, some plants would not allow too many cars of one color in a row. There may have been a work load leveling aspect, as you could not run too many A/C cars in a row, or too many manual trans cars, or too many tripowers, or too many sunroofs in a row. Certainly you couldn't have too many two tones, or vinyl tops in a row. Or maybe they just didn't like seeing them all the same.

In any case, when spraying manually there were separate guns and systems for the different colors. So after spraying a series of red cars you would hang that gun up and pick up the gun for the next vehicle. Separate gun, lines and paint vats for each.

Mechanized spray guns, on a reciprocating arm or gantry, would turn away and purge as you have suggested.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYgxgGlN8CM&t=1192s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5kqXN0gIb0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbTsvPSr_2M

For low volume or special colors (like John Deere green, or Mary Kay pink) there was usually a smaller separate system, with a smaller pot. That way you could load the unusual color for small runs and then clean the system when done with less waste.

I would remind the reader that the operator didn't worry about any of this. He could have been sweeping floors one day and painting cars the next. He just showed up and pulled the trigger, hopefully without screwing too much up. Skilled tradesmen (millwrights I suspect or maybe pipefitters) took car of all the setup, maintenance and cleaning.

K