exhaust pipes - were they painted black or natural

[Brad M.]

I just picked up a set of front exhaust pipes for small block (334925/334926) that were supposedly from a low mile 73 L82 car. They have the GM part number stamped in the ends and have the swaged reduction from 2.5" to 2.0" toward the flange (rather than having a welded seam). I will probably use these on my 71.

It appears that they have some remnants of black paint on them. So I am curious when these pipes were installed on a new car at the factory, would they have been painted black? Or were they natural?

I also had a set of service replacement 2.5 inch pipes('1829 and '1830) that I purchased over the summer which had black paint on them, but have previously bought other NOS service replacement pipes with no paint.

[Joe L.]

Re: exhaust pipes - were they painted black or nat

brad------

Originals installed on the car were bare steel. However, sometimes a little black-out paint may have gotten on them. This was actually more prevalent in the early C2 period. By the C3 period, I don't think too much, if any, paint got on the pipes. Likely, only from "touch up" blackout applications.

[Brad M.]

Re: exhaust pipes - were they painted black or nat

Thanks, I thought they were most likely bare, but this suprised me being that it was on the front pipe. I doubt it would have been near parts subject to black out, but who knows...

Maybe these pipes are not original but early service replacement or something. I was told they were original, but all I cared about was they were same part number that lists for by 71 and are the swaged type.

[Patrick H.]

Re: exhaust pipes - were they painted black or nat

Brad,

I've seen a low mile (6000+ range) 71 that had remnants of paint going up the exhaust a loooong way towards the front. My suspicion is that for whatever reason there may have been exhaust systems with much more black paint than others.

Hope that helps.

Patrick