Why did the factory choose blood orange (tangerine) as their werks race color?

[210bhp]

Knowingly or unknowingly chosen, it is also the colour which the human eye, even those with a slight colour deficiency, can detect against a low contrast background better than red. Some years ago ocean life jackets etc were changed from red to orange to accommodate increased detection/rescue at sea by colour defective observers. The colour the normal human eye is actually most sensitive to is 555nm which is very close to chartreuse but of course that would be of little use at sea as a safety colour to a colour defective.


Regards
Mike

[beh911]

Yes, but Elford won the 1967 Marathon in the 911r with sportamatic that was blood orange.

Ok, I missed that...
Proves the color changeover is difficult to understand due to the issues with historic photographs.
That is very early for orange, especially with the coming winter's red 68 Monte cars.

If Karim can find the Christo article, that might shed some light.


EDIT: I'm now convinced the 68 Monte cars were orange....

[RennTyp]

Ok, I missed that...
Proves the color changeover is difficult to understand due to the issues with historic photographs.
That is very early for orange, especially with the coming winter's red 68 Monte cars.

If Karim can find the Christo article, that might shed some light.

The factory Monte cars were orange in 68.

[beh911]

The factory Monte cars were orange in 68.

I guess I'm struggling with how people who faithfully reproduce these cars as replicas or in the automobilia world as models and art work can get it wrong.
Having crawled around the replica car at the 2012 Amelia event, I can't imagine doing all that work, only to have the wrong color.

Anyone have a kardex of one of the 68 Monte cars?

About the best period photo out there contrasting the colors:


Replica car (clearly red, and the wrong red for the year):

[steve shea]

Mike has it in post 11. Visibility. Has anyone heard the term international orange? Its been around since the 50's I think. Pretty common safety color.

[larwik]

"Has anyone heard the term international orange?" ...Yes, in the Aerospace/Aircraft industry...

Steve, are you possibly referring to Continental Orange for Porsches?...Super Nice color, btw... .../ Lars...

(From top to bottom: Guards Red, Continental Orange and the Tangerine targa)

[steve shea]

No Lars, I am thinking international orange. From the fifties. Yes aerospace but also many other applications for safety and visibility. From clothing to well, any use where visibility is crucial. Way back in the day we, me and one other, were about at our point of decision just below the summit of Denali. So we decided to go for it; maybe 1500/2000 vertical feet. There was a south west wind and thin streamers and lenticulars in the sky but our aneroid barometers read reasonable pressure. We figured we had enough time to summit and return. On the descent the storm came in with a fierce wind that slammed us with blizzard conditions and about 20 meters visibility. So we stumbled from wand to wand which we had left on the way up for just such an event. Each wand was international orange with an orange plastic streamer. We finally got off of Denali Pass and down to the Iglooplex at 17,000 feet where our tent was. It took a while to spot it in the whiteout but we finally found our orange tent. The color orange kind of save our butts on that trip.

[911T1971]

We are coming close and as said, in cold, snow and fog conditions, a speeding tangerine color 911R doing the Monte Rally was as visible as any orange tent at Denali mountain. And those tents were not red but orange too.

I think Richard von Frankenberg wrote the article in Christophorus but i need to find it, yet.

Meanwhile


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