Aurelia B20GT 4th Series wheel colour

[Parisien]

Sebastien....can you put up.....2/3/4/....30 more.... .....pics of your car, so very smart!


P

[Sebastien]

P
that would not add much to the subject, I fear!

Here an italian owned 4th series, in blue celeste (maybe they called it grigio at the time, I can't remember), with unicolor cream wheels!
(It would look strange with blue celeste rims!)
Enjoy!

Sébastien

[Parisien]

Fair enough Sebastien...........but I'd never tire of looking at them, separate thread?!




P

[chriswgawne]

I wonder whether the 2 colour steel wheels were a factory option on 4th Series onwards B20s?
To my mind and this is a very personal opinion, having coloured rims only looks 'right' when the body colour is dark such as lancia blue, green, black etc. One of the most attractive features of 3rd and early 4th Series B20s is their 'plain-ness' where nothing detracts from the styling and this is perfectly illustrated by Sebastien's 3rd Series. Coloured rims can make the car look a little more fussy.
Its a bit like the obsession with some (too many)  B24 owners for having wire Borrani type wheels. The original steels wheels with hubcaps whether B24 Spider or Convertible look fine.
Our beige early 4th series B20 which we have owned since 1978 is on silver Technomagnesio wheels (in ignorance I had the steel wheels powdercoated black!) but my project car (original colour was 'grigio' which can mean a whole range of colours) has been painted a darkish metallic grey as it originally came out of the factory from traces of paint on the steering column and this colour looks fine on the steel wheel rims with beige centres IMHO.

[B20B24]

Thanks for this feedback. Sebastien, your wheels look like the Avorio Lancia cream in the picture. Or are they the beige? - or something in between?

Whichever, it looks superb. My car will be black, too.

Best

Clive

[DavidLaver]

Have you the codes for that blue?   Its a lovely colour combination...

David

[adrian donovan]

This could run and run......so I thought going back to the original brochures would help.
The 8 page 4th series brochure ( the one with party goers in DJ's and long frocks, all smoking) sure enough has cars in several body colours, but all with the stainless steel trims and beige wheel centres, all fine there.
But - there's a pale off-white car with much darker beige wheel centres - to provide more of a contrast?
It gets worse - I've got two more different 4th series brochures , unfortunately in B&W, but the wheel centres in both are clearly much darker again ( black?) which contrast with lighter body colours.
So - I'm happy with the wheels on my car which is grigio celeste body colour and has the two colour wheels with trims - but this is clearly NOT the only scheme used !

[chriswgawne]

Yes Adrian, you are correct. I have looked at all my 3rd and 4th Series original B20 brochures and publicity shots and realise that the norm seems to be if the car is a pale colour then it has dark wheel centres with pale rims and chrome wheel trims. Strangely enough not many brochure and publicity shots are of dark cars whereas today, I have a feeling in Italy that the dark cars are more prized that the lighter ones.
I wonder whether anyone can give the definitive options available in period?
Chris

[GreenB20]

On a dark car I quite like body coloured wheels with the chrome trims, so that's what I've gone for.

[chriswgawne]

Looks great. Where did you get the wheel trims and how are they held in place might I ask?
Chris

[adrian donovan]

Ed - looks really good. The tricky bit is to keep the trims in place, as they do move about in use. Omicron sell the clips and although they're  horrid to fit, I think it's worth putting say about 5 or 6 on each wheel.

[GG]

Yes Adrian, you are correct. I have looked at all my 3rd and 4th Series original B20 brochures and publicity shots and realise that the norm seems to be if the car is a pale colour then it has dark wheel centres with pale rims and chrome wheel trims. Strangely enough not many brochure and publicity shots are of dark cars whereas today, I have a feeling in Italy that the dark cars are more prized that the lighter ones.
I wonder whether anyone can give the definitive options available in period?
Chris

Supposedly the wheel trims were an option, and can surprisingly be seen even as far back as a s.2 car, but I've never seen a factory listing of  options. In fact finding real definitive factory pricing or list of options is hard as well - the only thing found so far has been letters from Lancia to prospective buyers. What and how they would provide at the time remains a mystery. Somewhere there are probably some good dealer materials, perhaps, but they haven't surfaced yet. . 

As to wheel color, some say it was standardized and others have varients in dark or light. Original seems hard to define.

[GreenB20]

Looks great. Where did you get the wheel trims and how are they held in place might I ask?
Chris

I got them from Cavalitto, I think (it was a long time ago!); they are held in place by clips, but as yet they have not been on the car, so not sure how long thet will stay on 

[adrian donovan]

GG - I'm sure that the trims weren't an option - the period pictures seem to show trims on the 4th series as standard. The reason they are not always on the cars now is that they are easily damaged and the clips are not 100% reliable on rolled rims. And Lancia liked these trims - they were used on Flaminias and Flavias ( and early Fulvias?) but with screw fixings, which are much more secure even if they don't look so neat.

[GG]

Adrian -

You are probably right - the homologation (fiche) pictures for the s.3 show them, although not for the s.1.

Geoff