Engine Color

[RQ-B1899]

I would like to know if all the small block Chevy engines installed in Avanti II's were black

or were any ever painted Chevy orange from the factory?

Thanks in advance for the infornmation!!

[Gunslinger]

My '70 had its original engine when I bought it and it was orange.

To the best of my knowledge, all Chevy engines until about 1977-'78 were painted Chevy Orange. Beginning in late in '77 or early in the '78 model year all GM engines were painted "Corporate Blue" as it's known, even if not the actual name of the color. That came about due to GM mixing engines from various divisions in other division cars and buyers became upset at not knowing about that. They all became "GM engines" at that point.

Also to the best of my knowledge, small and big block engines painted black are crate engines, but I don't know when that began.

[IndyJimW]

Chevrolet changed to black painted engines in the eighties after the orange. Don't remember seeing blue engines but there may have been some. The 305 in my '87 Avanti is black.

Jim Wood

Also to the best of my knowledge, small and big block engines painted black are crate engines, but I don't know when that began.

Edited October 23, 2008 by IndyJimW

[WayneC]

I would like to know if all the small block Chevy engines installed in Avanti II's were black

or were any ever painted Chevy orange from the factory?

Thanks in advance for the infornmation!!

My '71 Avanti had an orange engine. Chevy switched V8 color from the 1955 thru 1976 "chevy orange" to "corporate blue" for 1977 engines.

If you have an eBay sign-on, use this link to look at what appears to be an original 1976 Avanti with an orange engine:

http://tinyurl.com/6jko53

Here's a 1977 Avanti... if you look closely, in one of the engine pics it has a (faded) blue intake manifold:

http://tinyurl.com/6olmhj

I'm not sure when Chevy went to black engines, but I think it was sometime around when they started using aluminum heads.

Rebuilt engines could be whatever color the rebuilder used (assuming he wasn't "restoring" the engine to original), black being a common color.