I just talked to my body man/painter by phone and he informed me that he prepared the car prior to painting without preparing the fender edges, as did not know at the time that the chrome arches were not original. The car has already been painted and clear coated once, sanded betwen and again painted and clear coated again today, so we are out of luck on the arches, but no pin stripe. My wife liked the arches anyhow, so there is no need now to spend time urging her to have them left off.
I know that most everyone on this forum will be disappointed, as I am, but to fix this now would involve another week of work, as would have to wait for drying time, then resand the car, rework the fender edges, order in more paint and clear coat, and then repaint it in silver and then more clear coats. While we have a full-time shop, we have over 35 cars and have other pressing issues with some of the other cars, so cannot possibly waste any more time with this (sorry). I guess I should have found this forum a month earlier to avoid this. I have seen pictures of the chrome arches on a red 280 and in my opinion they looked terrible. However on silver they blend in better, so am in hopes that we are OK. The car is not being judged anyhow, but we normally like to stay original as much as possible on most of our cars. My son has some modified muscle cars that are not original (wheels especially) and it does not matter for that type of car.
For Achim - I guess you have already figured out that Americans can screw up sometimes! Either way, I still appreciate the feedback and suggestions and wish I had known about this a few weeks ago.
For others - I will be posting pictures in a couple of weeks of the car when finished and reassembled. Arches or not, the paint job should be spectacular, if it comes out as good as most of ours in the past.
Fritz
