Truck Colors and WHY??

alpha42 · February 10, 2003

I have a white 2500Hd ext cab 4x4. It was the last one left at my local dealer-and it was one of my color choices anyway. I would NEVER get black again-my last truck was a myriad of swirls. No matter what I did. All new towels,wash mitt,bucket and Yes I tried Zanio wax. Dark colors are a nightmare. Pewter and silver are also easy keepers. Dark green and burgundy also require too much care. I don't have that kind of time.

sduquette · February 10, 2003

I've owned a total of 6 black cars, and my new truck is carbon metalic. I have never had a hard time keeping the paint looking good. You just have to be religious about your maintenence. I polish about 1 time every 2 weeks, and use the right towels for drying and polishing. I like the dark colors, and don't mind the maintenence

bowtiebob · February 10, 2003

This is an interesting topic to bring up. I am looking to get a truck this summer or fall, probably an '04 D/A. I can't decide what color to get. I like the looks of a clean white truck, but its kind of a boring color for a college guy. Black would be fine for just one night or something, but having to maintain it in the dirty winter and summer months would be a pain. I like maroon, which is what my current truck is, and I also like the new charcol grey or whatever its called. Are these colors especially difficult to keep clean? What about the new arrival blue, or the victory red?? Thank for your advice.

sduquette · February 10, 2003

I have the carbon metallic, it's very dark grey with a hint of green and whatever other colors in it. It seems to look clean, even when it is dirty, beautiful color IMO

City_Slicker · February 10, 2003

I stumbled in here with the big trucks!!

I have had 2 black vehicles and while they do look the great when they are clean, I drove myself crazy trying to keep them that way!! I love the dark gray truck I have now. I wanted to be able to use my truck without constant worry of scratches. If you get one scratch in that black it is extremely noticeable. Lets face it you cant keep all the scrathes out. Some dumba$$ will always hit it with a buggy or door and look at you like Ooops, and you will kill them and go directly to jail. The dark gray has a few scratches and I never notice them until I am right on them. I am very picky about the paint and I got disgusted every time I saw a scratch. The white, to me, unless the windows are tinted and the truck is really fixed up, looks like a company vehicle. I have always thought grays and blacks looked sweet. I really like the one guys truck on here I saw the other day. It was black with pewter two tone on the bottom, that is one heck uva match!!

I am not a big fan of red or blue, but thats my personal preference. I am sure Ryan and Tom will give me he!! over that comment!!

City_Slicker · February 10, 2003

If nobody tells them I will be cool, looks like they never come in here!! :thumb:

TxDoc · February 10, 2003

I had a black MB and it was hand-washed and waxed often. Washed every week and waxed every 3-4 weeks. No matter how clean, it showed dust, pollen and road grime.

I bought a white truck in 1997 and stuck with white on my 2003. White doesn't show scratches like other colors, it is cooler in the 100+ degree Texas heat, doesn't show dirt or dust and is a more visible color for possible better chance of being seen.

Below is an article on safety vs color

http://www.aaafoundation.org/resources/ind...button=carcolor

Car Color and Safety

White Paper

Need

A frequently asked question of Foundation staff is "What is the safest car color?" Psychological studies show that color has an effect on behavior, and there are other studies about color and conspicuity, but there are no studies examining the impact of car color on crash rates.

"Colors can create conditions that can cause fatigue, increase stress, decrease visual perception, damage eyesight, increase possible worker errors, and negatively affect orientation and safety" (www.colormatters.com). Studies examining traditional color psychology find blue is relaxing and red increases heart rate and blood pressure. Color affects mood and people make purchasing decisions based on color. However, it seems unlikely that a person who dislikes the color orange, for example, would purposely crash into an orange vehicle.

General studies have also been done to show the most visible colors for day and night; however, there are no studies directly addressing the relationship between car color (conspicuity) and crashes among passenger vehicles. The study below discusses colors for fire fighting equipment, and presumably it would have some relevance for passenger cars too:

It is noted that the color red, used for fire fighting equipment, is one of the least visible of vehicle colors. Optometrists note that, for its high visibility, lime yellow should be used by fire and rescue teams, as well as favored by trucks and car buyers. Lime yellow falls in the middle of the color spectrum (Schuman 1991).

Several Web sites focus on color and solicit opinions; as one might expect, the general public has many theories on color psychology. One Web site, Color Matters (www.colormatters.com), discusses the effect that color has on the mind and body. Visitors can pose questions and leave comments:

I once owned a 1980 "sand-beige" ford escort… In the 4 years that I owned the car, it was hit 11 times. Each time it was either completely stopped at a light, stop sign or parked. Apparently, this is a hard color to see, particularly on sunny days. Now, I drive a black VW and have not been in an accident in 5 years.

And:

My mother owned a silver-gray car. We noticed a significant number of near collisions on foggy morning and dusky evening hours. The silver seems to blend in with the road.

This type of speculation and frequent questions to Foundation staff underscore the timeliness of this topic. It's an obvious question to car buyers -- what color car is safest? However, it is not known if there is a relationship between car color and safety because studies have not been done.

Proposal

It is proposed that the Foundation support research to study the effects of car color on safety. A request for proposal (RFP) will suggest working with state Departments of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and AAA club-affiliated insurance companies to collect necessary data.

The relationship between car color and safety is complex. Background color (trees, desert, etc.), weather conditions (rain, fog, snow), and daylight have a profound effect on conspicuity.

At night, white is the most visible, but lime yellow stands out better against cloudy skies and snowy backdrops than does white. The color red is perceived as black at night. Also, people have particularly poor peripheral detection of red shades (Schuman 1991).

In addition, any study of the relationship between car color and crashes must consider the distribution of different colored cars on the road and whether certain colors are over or under-represented among certain types of drivers. For instance, any study that reports red cars are more prone to crashes needs to rule out higher number of red cars on the road and disproportionate numbers of bad drivers (young males) owning red cars.

Preliminary investigations indicate that some DMVs record car color. For instance, New York has registration data that includes car color and crash reports can be linked via license plate to obtain car color (see New York form in Appendix). Information on car color is not collected by most of the AAA clubs we contacted. For example, AAA Michigan does not have car color data for all insured cars, but does have car color data on the subset of cars involved in crashes (from the claims database). Furthermore, it is not possible to determine car color by linking via the vehicle identification number. Although a contractor could compare the distribution of AAA Michigan car colors involved in crashes (from claims data) to the distribution of all car colors in Michigan (obtained from the manufacturers), this would be too imprecise.

The contractor is expected to acquire valid data on car color and crashes in several states or localities. In determining the relationship between car color and safety, the contractor should try to go beyond process outputs, such as number of citations or arrests. Rather, the goal is to measure the crash rate -- a core outcome. Certain car colors are more likely to be caught for traffic violations (Newman and Willis 1993), but this is not the main concern of this paper.

Potential confounding variables include age, sex, weather conditions and the time of day that the crash occurred. One could envision a graph of car color and crashes, with a line for each car color juxtaposed against time of day. Are different car colors involved in crashes at different times of day? Further multivariate analyses would be done to investigate the relationship between car color and safety while controlling for potential confounding variables.

Discussion

In preparing this white paper very little information was found specifically on car color and safety. People assume that yellow is the safest color because it is used for school buses. However, when the National Conference on School Transportation chose the color at their meeting in 1939, nothing was mentioned about the expected effect on traffic safety. Similarly, many people think red is a safe and conspicuous vehicle color because fire trucks are red; again we found no research supporting this belief.

References:

Newman M, Willis FN, Bright Cars and Speeding Tickets, Journal of Applied Psychology, January 1993;23(1):79-83.

Shuman M, Traditional Red Colors Safety, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, April, 1991;2:22-24.

Who You Callin' Yellow? Traffic Safety, September/October 2000:13.

carguru · February 10, 2003

I'm one of those guys who likes the vic red. I've had red trucks for as long as I can remember. Red is not quite as high maintenence as black, but will show swirls. I like black quite a bit, but I refuse to buy a black truck. It looks great when clean and shiny, but black will show every little imperfection. It shows dirt only a few minutes after you wash it. Don't even get me started about when pollen season comes.

Of course, any of the dark colors are harder to maintain than the light ones. If you want low maintenence, get white, silver or pewter. The drawbacks are that you will tend to see much more road grit than you would the darker colors (tar, mud, etc). My theory is dark colored vehicles attract light colored dirt, light colored vehicles attract dark colored dirt. There just happens to be much more light colored dirt out there.

Shaners · February 10, 2003

IMO, Silver and Pewter hide more kinds/colors of dirt than any other color. :thumb:

JimWilson · February 10, 2003

I used to detail vehicles, and as most have noted, black is the absolute worst color to keep looking nice. It's very impressive when new, but it soon looks as though you've washed it with steel wool (unless your REAL good with a buffer). Closely following black are maroon -- Carmine Red in GM parlance, which is what my truck is -- and then dark gray, then ... well, just about any dark color after that. Living in NJ, and not having a garage, it's d@mn near impossible to keep it look good, but I just couldn't resist buy it when I say her sitting on the lot. I truly like the color, but man what a pain in the butt to keep looking nice.

99silveradoz71 · February 11, 2003

My truck is almost Ryan's twin. I had a black 92 Jimmy that was tough to keep clean, and the blue is as well, but when done up properly, it looks great. If I had it to do over, I would've at least looked at the dark gray.

timk49 · February 11, 2003

My last Silverado was a 95 in Teal green. I don't remember what the real name of the color was. It was the best color vehicle I have ever owned. I used to get lots of comments that the truck looked newer than it really was. My 2003 is light Pewter. I must say it cleans up nicely and I think it is a rich looking color. It hides the Southern California dust and looks great with the polished Stainless steel nerf bars.

White is just to service truck oriented and black is just to hard to keep black.

lrymal · February 11, 2003

...My 2003 is light Pewter. I must say it cleans up nicely and I think it is a rich looking color.

Noticed that on mine, also. With all the rains we have been having, I could barely tell that my truck was dirty with road grime. This is also a good color to blend in with chrome or black accessories.

Mortgage Paul · February 11, 2003

Im the Opposite of Henry Ford. I Like any color as long as its White.

White here stays so much cooler in the summer. Takes less time to cool off.

steppetoe · February 11, 2003

I never used to buy anything other than white, but this time around, I saw the truck I wanted and it happened to be dark gray. I have to say that it's perfect for the truck. Really fits it well. Hopefully it'll hold up, I always liked the white trucks because they hide the scratches so well.