Charley, I agree with you 100% on being totally enthusiastic about finding survivor cars to inspect and document but just because one car is one way doesn't mean they were all that way…(hell my car has a body colored firewall (no black out) and it came from the factory that way) But that's why places like CRG is awesome because they compile data on many, many cars before making any call on what the DATA proves. Unfortunately this is a paint finish dilemma where many factors come into play such as fading, polishing, refinishing, ect...and without a lot of hard evidence it's impossible to say what's absolutely correct here and probably why there’s no definitive right or wrong. And as for memory fading, how many times do you say to yourself "I could swear it was this way" or "wow, I don't remember it being that way" when going back and referencing pictures or the AIM when working on your car...I know I do it all the time & that's why I took over 700 pictures when pulling my 59000 mile car apart and probably why it got a score of 91.6% correct my first year in legends concours. Just saying the original owner may remember it one way, and the car may only have 26000 miles on it but it’s still 40 years old and even if the owner only washed & waxed it once a month, that’s still 480 times that panel and paint have been buffed and rubbed on. Even at a ¼ of that number semi gloss will be getting pretty shiny.
Again, just my opinion and opinions are like a**holes, everyone’s got one!
