Paint color matching on aftermarket pieces
 

So here's a question for you all..

I've seen several of the vendors that are selling body panels, lips, spoilers etc, several of them have stated that these items come unpainted, to avoid color match issues.

My question(s) I guess is why would there be color match issues? All of our cars are approximately a year or so old or less.. So I would think the paint color would still be pretty fresh and not faded. Wouldn't a bodyshop just order the paint from a Nissan dealer using the paint code for the car? What actually would need to be matched if this was done? Isn't this what happens if you buy a pre-painted sideskirt or spoiler from a dealer?

And especially on things like lips, sideskirts and items that aren't blended into the body existing body panels, these are bolt on/stick on pieces, so I'd think any light variation is going to be super hard to notice on something like that.


Thoughts?

~Metallic colors
~Different batches even at factory

There are more things, but all of these add up which can create differences in paint color. It is minor usually and hard to see normally, but it would suck to drop 600-1000 on a body piece and the paint be slightly darker/lighter or not metallic enough for certain colors.

Dreamer is right on track.

There are just too many variances in the factory paint and the way someone mixes it for the paint to be a spot on match.

Another reason that we don't ship painted parts is the high probability of damage to the paint during transit. It is almost a guarantee that something will be scratched or damaged during shipping.

wat dreamer said.

for metallics it's nearly impossible to get a perfect match due to metallic particle orientation. so for me, i prefer to have lips pre-painted. :)