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Very late GT/E hatch. Barn stored 18 years


Danny D114BCW
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Quite a memorable reg on this car..E for ectasy...101 for room 101 and RFD could of almost been RWD...so the f is for Freddie Mercury,or maybe forrest that would be more in keeping with the nature of the car somewhat.

What colour is that dan .is it dolphin grey:unsure:..now that she has had the fresh paint that mint interior in contrast is making a lot of sense now.

Commendable barn back on the road project mate,will be a cracking car for someone,even I would think twice about this one,and that's saying something as at one point i would refuse to even recognise the hatch as a manta as I was so pro coupe.:blink::thumbup

Edited by evo3000
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Ha Ha yeh it is a nice reg! Its Steel grey although the body shop are adamant its dolphin grey (it isn't). Yeh the interior is mint and was untouched when i found it as the build sheet was under the rear seat!

I like hatches but prefer the coupes, i just hate the GT/E hatch rear bumpers, they make the car look old and stick out a mile! its more of a ledge than a bumper. Hence why I made it look like and exclusive. It drives brilliantly too! pulls like a train, quiet with no knocks, diff and box are silent. I will make somebody a great car.

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15 hours ago, Danny D114BCW said:

Its Steel grey

Sorry dan, its not steel grey, that is a slightly darker grey with a hint of blue, its a rare colour as it was only in the Opel range for about 8 months, i have a an 1800 hatch in this colour festering up a corner if you'd like to take it on.

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3 hours ago, MANTAMAN said:

Sorry dan, its not steel grey, that is a slightly darker grey with a hint of blue, its a rare colour as it was only in the Opel range for about 8 months, i have a an 1800 hatch in this colour festering up a corner if you'd like to take it on.

I will take it on

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7 hours ago, MANTAMAN said:

Sorry dan, its not steel grey

LOL the great colour debate again.can we establish what colour it actually is then :blink:

22 hours ago, Danny D114BCW said:

Ha Ha yeh it is a nice reg! Its Steel grey although the body shop are adamant its dolphin grey (it isn't). Yeh the interior is mint and was untouched when i found it as the build sheet was under the rear seat!

I like hatches but prefer the coupes, i just hate the GT/E hatch rear bumpers, they make the car look old and stick out a mile! its more of a ledge than a bumper. Hence why I made it look like and exclusive. It drives brilliantly too! pulls like a train, quiet with no knocks, diff and box are silent. I will make somebody a great car.

Great stuff mate,:thumbup...what price are you going to be looking at on this one when she comes up for sale.:unsure:

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3 hours ago, evo3000 said:

LOL the great colour debate again.can we establish what colour it actually is then :blink:

Great stuff mate,:thumbup...what price are you going to be looking at on this one when she comes up for sale.:unsure:

I'd be interested to hear what colour Mantaman thinks it is. I certainly don't recall any other greys being available around that era (1987) other than Steel Grey and Dolphin grey. This one is definitely Steel Grey.

From an earlier post:

According to the GM Colour and Trim brochure from 1987, the colour choices for the Manta range was as follows:

  • Polar White
  • Carmine Red
  • Black
  • Monaco Blue
  • Platinum
  • Dolphin Grey
  • Steel Grey
  • Astro Silver
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God dammit i'm glad my manta is black,and no its not  starmist its black its black as black can be .its .....well its just beautiful......end of .......sorry just dropped the mic.:thumbup

Edited by evo3000
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Time to resurrect this thread perhaps, it makes for interesting reading:

One thing to note with the grey colours, is that they do seem prone to changing hue depending on the light reflecting off them when photos are taken. i.e. cloudy/sunny/blue skies etc. It also depends on the White Balance setting on the camera. By default, all digital cameras look for a neutral grey when trying to calculate the auto WB setting. This affects the final result obtained which is why both Dophin Grey and Steel Grey are hard to differentiate unless sitting beside one another.  

Edited by Monaco Blue
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On 23/09/2017 at 17:25, Danny D114BCW said:

Its steel grey as they didn't do the GT/Es in any other grey

I once had a grey GT/E hatch that was the same colour as yours, they are both a different grey to the steel grey 1800 hatch i have.

Information from Rainer Manthey's book on the Opel Manta B.

Dolphin grey - 115

Steel Grey - 114

Platinum - 112 ( rare Exculsive metallic light grey colour, a really nice colour for a Manta )

Light Grey - 108 ( i think this might have a rare early B series GT/J pale grey colour that never made it to the UK, there is an advert with a pale grey GT/J )

Look at the VIN plate and check the code number.

On 23/09/2017 at 10:06, Monaco Blue said:

According to the GM Colour and Trim brochure from 1987, the colour choices for the Manta range was as follows:

But there was the option of special order, for instance there are two MK 1 Cavaliers in Manta A Signal Yellow, the famous motor show example, LOU and another in Scotland.

 

On 23/09/2017 at 11:07, evo3000 said:

God dammit i'm glad my manta is black

Black code 826 or black code 115 ( same code as Dolphin Grey !!) ?? Exclusives had a metalic black which is known to us as Starmist which maybe Anthracite Metallic - 107 on the colour chart.

On 23/09/2017 at 02:49, Kevin Abbott said:

I will take it on

 

On 23/09/2017 at 08:01, Danny D114BCW said:

Yes Ian I would be interested in that hatch, any pictures? 

 Great, free to a home where i can be sure it will be restored not get ripped apart just to put the gearbox and sump on ebay, it's going around the sunroof but i have a complete Hatch roof non-sunroof cut off a Manta that comes with it. I need to get busy with my camera.

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8 hours ago, MANTAMAN said:

I once had a grey GT/E hatch that was the same colour as yours, they are both a different grey to the steel grey 1800 hatch i have.

Information from Rainer Manthey's book on the Opel Manta B.

Dolphin grey - 115

Steel Grey - 114

Platinum - 112 ( rare Exculsive metallic light grey colour, a really nice colour for a Manta )

Light Grey - 108 ( i think this might have a rare early B series GT/J pale grey colour that never made it to the UK, there is an advert with a pale grey GT/J )

Look at the VIN plate and check the code number.

But there was the option of special order, for instance there are two MK 1 Cavaliers in Manta A Signal Yellow, the famous motor show example, LOU and another in Scotland.

 

Black code 826 or black code 115 ( same code as Dolphin Grey !!) ?? Exclusives had a metalic black which is known to us as Starmist which maybe Anthracite Metallic - 107 on the colour chart.

 

 Great, free to a home where i can be sure it will be restored not get ripped apart just to put the gearbox and sump on ebay, it's going around the sunroof but i have a complete Hatch roof non-sunroof cut off a Manta that comes with it. I need to get busy with my camera.

I can recall having seen a couple of the grey GT/J's back around 81/82 (W/X reg).  Looked very drab only lifted slightly by the GT/J logos and stripes. Sort of blended in with the Paisley/Glasgow weather! :)

Interesting re the Signal Yellow Cavaliers. Back around 1978/79 a workmate had a P reg Signal Red 1.6GL. Where he parked it at our work in Renfrew (Scotland) was outside the house of a women who owned a P reg Signal Yellow 1.6GL. Quite often both were parked outside on the road together. Both lovely colours. I'm pretty sure there were more around in Signal Yellow than you suggest as I definitely saw a few about, but as you say, it wasn't common.

Re Platinum. it wasn't really a grey but more of a pale oyster/gold. Platinum to be exact! :) As per this one:

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C894222  The 2 front views show the colour spot-on.

 

Edited by Monaco Blue
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8 hours ago, Monaco Blue said:

Interesting re the Signal Yellow Cavaliers. Back around 1978/79 a workmate had a P reg Signal Red 1.6GL. Where he parked it at our work in Renfrew (Scotland) was outside the house of a women who owned a P reg Signal Yellow 1.6GL. Quite often both were parked outside on the road together. Both lovely colours. I'm pretty sure there were more around in Signal Yellow than you suggest as I definitely saw a few about, but as you say, it wasn't common.

 There were a lot of Yellow tones in the Vauxhall range at that time, Jamiaca Yellow which was a bright yellow, Pineapple Yellow which was paler and Sandglow Biege which is the precise colour of Birds Custard !! and it appears Signal Yellow was a more popular special order than i'd imagined. Manta people have trouble seperating grey coloured cars in photos, Cavalier MK 1 enthusiast have trouble with photos of yellow Cavaliers !

 I guess it is an indicator of the times they were produced in, back in the 70's buying a new car privately was a major event in somebodies life, a car was still a very expensive luxury item for most families proportional to the annual household income, people lived near to their work, didn't travel far or very often for leasure activities so it was possible to get by with public transport which was still clinging on to some sort of co-ordinated system back then, so buying a new car was something a great deal of planning went into and waiting a little longer to get it in the precise colour desired was worth the delay.

 By the 90's cars had become a necessity, just another household item that had to be bought, still very expensive but not as much so compared to annual income, the availability of special colour options perhaps decreased and cars were not seen as being so special that it was worth a lot of extra trouble and expense to buy a new one in a colour that was not standard, which would also have been considered a risk to the re-sale value, The price of a special colour may also have been a factor, if a car manufacturer did have colours in their whole range that were not offered on a particular model then having a special colour could be be so hard to organise into the new 'just in time' production line that it would be prohibitively expensive.

 Now things have come round full circle, thanks to computers being linked to each other around the world, a new car buyer can sit down with their dealer and tick off on a list the exact car they want from a huge variety of options, The Opel Adam has an enormous number of potential colour combinations, add to this the trim options and times all of these with model options and it would be a rare event for two cars that were truely the same to parked next each other. One type of Smart car the plastic body panels could be taken off and replaced by ones in a different colour, which might sound like fun to some people until they have to inform the DVLA of the colour change !

8 hours ago, Monaco Blue said:

Re Platinum. it wasn't really a grey but more of a pale oyster/gold. Platinum to be exact! :) As per this one:

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C894222  The 2 front views show the colour spot-on.

 

 yes that is Platinum as i remember it, interesting that is on a GT/E, i have only ever seen this colour on exclusives, also this Manta has original front fog lights, something not seen very often.

Edited by MANTAMAN
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16 hours ago, MANTAMAN said:

 There were a lot of Yellow tones in the Vauxhall range at that time, Jamiaca Yellow which was a bright yellow, Pineapple Yellow which was paler and Sandglow Biege which is the precise colour of Birds Custard !! and it appears Signal Yellow was a more popular special order than i'd imagined. Manta people have trouble seperating grey coloured cars in photos, Cavalier MK 1 enthusiast have trouble with photos of yellow Cavaliers !

Now things have come round full circle, thanks to computers being linked to each other around the world, a new car buyer can sit down with their dealer and tick off on a list the exact car they want from a huge variety of options, The Opel Adam has an enormous number of potential colour combinations, add to this the trim options and times all of these with model options and it would be a rare event for two cars that were truely the same to parked next each other. One type of Smart car the plastic body panels could be taken off and replaced by ones in a different colour, which might sound like fun to some people until they have to inform the DVLA of the colour change !

Yes that is Platinum as i remember it, interesting that is on a GT/E, i have only ever seen this colour on exclusives, also this Manta has original front fog lights, something not seen very often.

Ah yes, lots of lovely insipid pastel shades back then that Vauxhall seemed to favour. Thank goodness there were some nice metallics available. I almost bought an S plate Chevette GLS in a sort of pale duck egg green colour. It didn't look so bad being a GLS.

The runout of the 1st series Manta B's (81/82MY) in were available in some interesting Metallic colours. Best were Aquamarine, Anthracite, a light Metallic blue and a red wine colour which looked lovely.

I was on the Opel website recently looking at the new Opel Insignia. Seems there's an 'Exclusiv' model available over there and if I'm not wrong it appeared you could have any colour you liked at extra cost. The colour configurator certainly seemed to indicate that. Great fun playing with the sliders!

It's a pity more Manta's weren't fitted with the factory foglights. They suit the car perfectly. I recall seeing a few Platinum non-Exclusive GT/E's. Sales of the Manta seemed to stall in 1986 & 1987 which were boosted by both batches of Exclusives.

Starmist Black which you mentioned earlier was an interesting colour. from a distance it looked black, but on closer inspection, you could see the silver bits in the paint quite clearly which tended to sparkle. An aptly named colour. 

I've posted a link in  General Discussions' to some old Vauxhall/Opel brochures to stop clogging up Danny's thread with off-topic diversions.

Edited by Monaco Blue
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Well done Danny, you really must get some a photos of it stood next the coupe behind it in the photo, being the same colour it would emphasize the different body styles.

 One thing that i would do, paint that rocker cover !! Hamerite black spray cans comes out a semi matt finish very like the original Opel black and it will stand the heat,

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That does look good! I've even come around to that brown interior! I'd be sad to let that one go if I were you. I'd guess the new owner to be will be delighted with their purchase!

Agreed re painting the cam cover. I'd also blacken the piece of card in front of the radiator with some shoe polish as a finishing touch.

Another vote for a photo session next to the coupe! 

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On 10/6/2017 at 23:43, MANTAMAN said:

Well done Danny, you really must get some a photos of it stood next the coupe behind it in the photo, being the same colour it would emphasize the different body styles.

 One thing that i would do, paint that rocker cover !! Hamerite black spray cans comes out a semi matt finish very like the original Opel black and it will stand the heat,

When you start to 'tart' it can put people off as when things are left original (such as this car) it speaks volumes

I did put them in order but the site reorganised them & I cant be arsed to sort it out! 

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15 hours ago, Danny D114BCW said:

When you start to 'tart' it can put people off as when things are left original (such as this car) it speaks volume

Project images are available to Club Members Only, Click to become an OMOC Member.

 

That's a fair point I suppose. It will be easy enough for the new owner to do if they desire. 

Never been a fan of the ATS Cup alloys, but they do look good on that Coupe! Nice set of photos. 

 

 

 

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they do look SO GOOD together, its a shame they are going to be split up, perhaps they should have been sold as a pair !

16 hours ago, Danny D114BCW said:

When you start to 'tart' it can put people off as when things are left original (such as this car) it speaks volumes

There is originality and there's spoiling the ship for an " A'puth of Tar ", true originallity is very good but you've done a certain amount of restoration to the rest of the car so why not the cam cover ?

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