Alright, so I had an accident in my spa yellow 2003 ap1 which required them to repaint essentially the entire car in order to properly blend the paint. Well, when I went to look at it on Friday, it had like a metallic yellow instead of the flat yellow. I like it better, but could they have gotten the paint codes confused, and if so, with what? Did Honda ever make a yellow s2k with a metallic yellow? I really don't care that much bout resale value because I love my car and plan on keeping it until it dies. I like the metallic better, but I'm not sure what to think at this point....especially since it wasn't metallic when it went in. Any insights on this would be appreciated.

 

Probably rio is what I am guessing.

 

They did the same thing to my car... Where did you get yours painted?

Open your doors and your gas tank, they'll probably be different colors, be sure to take it back and tell them if they can't match the paint then they need to make sure all visible portions are the same color.

 

ive heard spa is the hardest color to match

 

I think Spa and Rio are both metallic, but Rio has a pearl finish and Spa does not. They should have used the paint code on your door or called Honda with your VIN to figure out which paint to mix.

 

Spa do have a pearl finish....Very nice glow color.

 

I'm not sure if metallic is the same as pearl but my yellow S (ap2) is considered pearl and has bits of shiny pieces in it. So, I guess metallic could be pearl? Either way, it isn't flat at all.

HTH

 

Metallic and pearl are not the same from what I understand. Metallic has a metal flake in it making it shiny, pearl adds some kind of smooth sheen paint effect. There are lots of metallic paints that are not pearl.

 

The official color is Spa Yellow Pearl, though Rio Yellow Pearl had much more of a pearl effect. My guess is they used Rio.

 

I've done a bunch of research on the Spa Yellow paint and it is incredibly hard to match, as it's a 3 stage paint, with a mid-coat of green that has to be applied by eye. I've also gotten on NSX forums, and they agree and have gone through huge ordeals to try to get it to match, with multiple resprayings.
PM VietS2k. He has a guy that did his paint and it matched up VERY well. The previous owner of my car had the rear resprayed, and it is very close, although you can still tell if you look closely.