Some of you who have received the pads asked me about the brownish surface hue and whether this was original so I decided to answer here in case more are interested in what we have found out.
Of course, everybody who as ever seen a good firewall pad knows that it is black and a bit shiny and the many photos that were posted in this topic and the one before by 49er and thelews, and many others demonstrate that quite well. Clearly, our material is not pitch black and not shiny, but then it also wasn't exposed to a hot engine compartment and oil fumes for 45 years either. Obviously we do not know what the color of the very first material was but we do know what the color was of a pad that was bought in 1974, and even better, we know how this color has changed after installation.
The owner of a 250SL bought two pads in 1974 and installed one in his car but saved the other one since he knew that the material has a limited life time. Dave Gallon, who is currently restoring the car, removed the pad again and guess what, it is now black but the other one is a medium gray as shown in the attached photos. The owner believes that the gray one hasn't changed color over the years since he had unwrapped it a few times to be used as a template to cut bulk material and believes that he would have noticed.
I have taken these photos in the shade and in full sunshine and on two different backgrounds, hoping that this will provide a good impression for how the surface color has changed over the last 27 years.
So, here we have a pad that was and still is gray - but not brownish - and that turned black after installation. We do not know if our material will turn black over time but given this example we think it might change too.
Since we are all used to seeing a black firewall pad and some may not want to wait an obvious solution is a color change. Because I can only attach four photos I'll show the options in my next post.
