[Heathkit] SB series cabinet paint

[Glen Zook]

I grew up 35 miles from the old Heath plant in St. Joseph, Michigan (LaPorte, Indiana).  Remember that the Heath mailing address was in Benton Harbor but the actual plant (from the mid 1960s until they went out of the electronic kit business) was on the south side of Benton Harbor in St. Joseph.  I used to drive up to the plant several times a year after I got my driver's license at age 16 in February 1960.  Normally I did not have much money to spend but I used to "drool" over the equipment in the showroom that was located in the plant.  Now I often had a question on one of the Heath items that I had at the time and the receptionist would telephone back to the engineering department and someone, often the original designer of the equipment, would come out and talk to me.  Usually I left the factory with a hand-drawn schematic and a paper bag full of parts (to make the modification suggested by the engineer) at no cost!  Now that was service!  However, I
 went off to college (Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Georgia) in September of 1962 and then got married in June 1965 (in Atlanta) and basically left the area at that time.  When I graduated from college in April 1967 I was hired by Collins Radio Company at the "new" corporate headquarters here in Richardson, Texas.  Have lived in Richardson ever since.

I have received several E-Mails directly on this subject (not sent to the "list") in the past 24 hours all of which confirmed my observations on at least 5 different colors on the cabinets.  One person stated that he used to build the SB-200 and SB-220 kits for others (also having built the DX- series equipment including the DX-20, DX-35, DX-40, and DX-100) and that the cabinets were definitely different colors when he opened the boxes and there was no rhyme or reason as to the colors.

There are slight differences in the Johnson "maroon" paint and in the gray that Hallicrafters used on equipment like the HT-32 series, HT-37 series, S-107, S-108, SX-110, SX-111, SX-140, and others.  The same thing is true of just about all of the amateur radio manufacturers at the time.  However, the color differences are very minor, usually just a "hint" and those were, I believe, due to different "batch" mixing.  But the differences in the color of the SB-Line (up to the SB-104) cabinets was not just a batch mixing difference because the actual colors ranged from the light gray-green that was used on the SB-104 units to a really ugly (in my opinion) light green that appeared more of a yellow-green than anything else with varying levels of color ranging from very light to more of a "medium" color with the actual "shade" of green varying as well.  If all of the cabinets were supposed to be the light gray-green of the SB-104 then someone in Heath's
 incoming parts inspection department definitely was not doing their job!  Or, if the painting was done "on site" then the person actually mixing the paint had to be color blind.

In order to get the closest "match" to the original paint color on "boat anchor" cabinets I try to find a point on the inside of the cabinet usually where the chassis was in contact.  Such a point has usually been shielded from sunlight and airborne contamination from things like cigarette smoke and so forth.  In the vast majority of cases the particular "shade" of paint in that area is usually as close as possible to the original color even if the original paint job was applied decades ago.  Then I take the cabinet to my local Sherwin-Williams paint store (2 miles from my house) to get the color "matched".  Now some of the other customers get "strange looks on their faces" when I walk in with a radio cabinet.  But, the store employees are used to me and do not "blink an eye".  I have found that over the years the outside of the cabinet on many examples has definitely faded due to sunlight.

So far my local store has been able to get a "perfect" color match to the sample.  There is also a Sherwin-Williams "warehouse" store that deals with major manufacturers of all sorts of things including telecommunications devices that is about 10 miles from my house.  I went there one time because my local store did not stock a particular paint type that I wanted to try.  This was for repainting a Collins KWM-1 cabinet which is definitely a different gray from the S-Line and KWM-2 series.  The clerk at the store used their computer matching system to check the color.  He then went into the warehouse proper and came back with a couple of spray cans that they stocked for several telecommunications manufacturers.  The paint in the spray can was an EXACT match to the paint on the KWM-1.  In fact, I was able to repaint the cabinet pieces including the edge of the front panel and it was impossible to tell where the new paint ended and the original paint
 started.  It seems that Collins used an industry standard color that has been around at least since World War II.

Since I was never employed by the Heath Company I have no direct knowledge of what went on inside the plant where things like paint colors are concerned.  However, I know that the colors on the cabinets of the SB-Line equipment that I purchased new in the 1967 through 1970 were definitely of a different color from the other SB-Line units when I opened the box.  It is the same thing with other SB-Line equipment that I have acquired over the years.  Basically, the color of the paint on the cabinets have been very different even on exactly the same model.  Also, the paint inside has generally been the same as the outside which, in my mind, rules out sunlight as a direct cause of the color differences.

Anyway, I believe that we agree that the light gray-green used on the SB-104 and some of the rest of the SB-Line cabinets is the most attractive of the various colors and that is "the" color to match.  At least that is the color that I have had matched and use on my SB-Line cabinets as well as on those cabinets that I repaint for others.

Glen, K9STH

Website:  http://k9sth.com


--- On Fri, 6/27/08, kim.herron at sbcglobal.net <kim.herron at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

Well Glen, all I know is that the info that I was given was that the cab color never changed.  I do live in Heath country up here. The front panel color was different and changed as you say, three times.  The Cab color was "supposed" to be the color that I sited. I have seen several different cab colors just like you, but the correct color is what I stated.  If you have a Johnson transmitter from the mid fifties to early sixties, you see the same thing.  I won't tell you that the colors from certain suppliers weren't different, only that they weren't correct.  I suppose the QC people weren't real concerned about the color as much as other items