I was applying my Zaino polish to my new 06 Tungsten grey GT today and I noticed something very concerning: THE PAINT ON THE BUMPERS DOES NOT MATCH THE PAINT ON THE REST OF THE CAR. These picts show the difference. The bumpers are clearly grey/silver, whereas the main body paint is the stuff many of you are calling purple-ish grey metallic. I am not happy about this, and will be contacting Ford about this quality control issue. I didn’t realize I was getting the TWO-TONE TUNGSTEN GREY. Please respond to this thread if your Tungsten grey car is Two-Tone like mine. We need to find out how widespread this is and notify Ford. Either color would be nice, but I would prefer consistency. Also, please respond if you think I’m over-reacting or too picky. At nearly $30k, you’d expect a little more quality from Ford.

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I can't tell the difference in the photos, but I'm sure you can. Should be a simple fix by Ford. Please keep us posted on developments.

 

I think your noticing more of the plastic modifier in the bumper, and not seeing it on the fender. The color looks close, but the metallic colors are always hard to match. I might be more concerned when my car gets here.

 

I don't own a Mustang, but are the materials different? I haven't looked that closely at the bumper and body for material composition.

 

It looks different to me and has me concerned about my Tungsten coming in. I don't know much about paint, but I would think it should look the same on either material. I wonder if the body and bumpers are painted seperately, different lots of paint, and then joined later. Could someone whon knows say?

 

It may just be the material. The bumber is plastic while the quarter panel is metal. The paint may just bond differently with the two.

 

thats what I was thinking too.

I do see a bit of a difference in the pictures

 

I can see what hes saying in the pics.
I would think its because the bumpers plastic and the fenders metal. But I am by far an expert.

 

wow thats wierd....does the rear bumper look the same?

i think like everyone else said its more of a material issue

too bad that Tungsten doesnt seem to be as popular as when it first was announced

 

Falcon:

What a kowinky dink... I was zaino'n mine up this AM too. I too noticed what your talking about... Mine is very slight and the light has to be hitting it a certain way. But I've had other cars like this too, where the plactic bumper parts are slightly different than the metal painted one. Boy does that zaino shine the s*** out of this color.
I have to go rest my arms... to sore to keep typing....

 

I understand that bonding may be different between plastic and metal, but both should have been primed first to avoid issues like these when the actual paint is applied. This is part of the function of primers. It does look as though they were painted at different times with different paints. In the picts, both bumper and side panels were polished, to prevent the illusion of differences between plastic and metal. Trust me, the colors are truly different as I mention in the original post. I really don't think any auto manufacturer attempts to have painted bumpers look differently from the main body paint.

 

To me the plastic bumper looks more like what Tungsten SHOULD be and I agree there is a quality control issue here that needs to be addressed. I am changing my order from Tunsten to Redfire because I can not tolerate the lavender that you clearly can see in the upper body paint. This has been such a huge disappointment to me as NO ONE wanted tungsten any more than I did. Ford needs to get its act together. But then I oredered a brand new Cadillac in 1986. All the panels came from 3 different plants and they were all different colors. And there was nothing plastic on that car.

 

Rick, I hear ya. I don't mind the purple-ish grey, but I'd prefer the whole car to be one consistent color. And yes, the bumper color is the Tungsten color people thought they were ordering. The bumper clearly has no purple tones. Did Barney sneak into the paint room at Ford?

 

Too sad, it's a common problem throughout the industry. I've even seen repainting that they do not match up. That's not the case on our O5 or my O3 Envoy. In the past Ford's fascia's were painted in the trim factory before shipping to assembly plant, if that's the program today.

By the way I do not mind a purple tint in Sun light. I have only seen Tungsten on a Saleen so far. Really liked it a lot.

 

I'm trying to order a small bottle of Tungsten Ford touch-up paint for painting over stone chips in the future. Ford doesn't have it available yet.....I wonder what color that will be: bumper Tungsten color or purple-grey Tungsten?

 

I thought it was best to let paint cure for a couple months before polishing or waxing?

As far as the colors go...to me they look same,just bumpers dont seem to have as much medal flake to them...

 

I would think/hope that regardless of what caused the problem, the bumpers will be resprayed. It is obvious that they do not match. If they don't consider this a legitimate paint problem and it is not an isolated case - going be alot of unhappy campers out there.

 

That picture illustrates the point I was trying to make in the other thread. The bumper is the color I expected Tungsten to be. The fender is the lavender (you can clearly see the red and blue specks) I see when I look at it in person.

I don't know the paint process for the parts of the body, and if they're painted in the same batch with the exact same mix, or how much variation they allow.

Sorry to hear your parts (whatever color you want them to be) don't match. That would drive me $%&#ing nuts. :bang: