1938 silver tan

[Bruce T]

I am restoring a 1938 BT and painting it a standard 1938 HD color, Silver Tan with Sunshine blue stripe. Does anyone know if the Sunshine Blue stripe was originally edged in another (lighter) color?

[Steve Little]

Hi Bruce.
I wonder if John Pierce might have the information your after?
I cant say that I’ve ever clapped eyes on a 38 that was painted in that scheme.
If the stripes of the other paint options were edged, then one could reasonably surmise that the blue stripe might have been.
ps did you mean colour
Regards Steve

[Bruce T]

Thanks for your reply to this thread Steve.
John Pierce has been extremely helpful and he supplied me with the Silver Tan and Sunshine Blue colour chips a couple of years ago. John also suggested that this particular 1938 colour combination did indeed include edging to the striping. Other people have suggested this also. My hesitation is that Harley Davidson never made mention of any edging for that particular colour combination in 1938. If it was a typo error on the part of HD then it was never corrected as they published the different colour combinations for 1938 machines in many publications and never once included an edging colour for the Silver Tan and Sunshine Blue combination. However all other (police colour not included) colour combinations for 1938 did have edging on the striping in 1938 and this was clearly stated throughout the HD publications in 1938.
It would be great if someone out there could help me with this one. Should the 1938 colour Silver Tan with Sunshine Blue have edging and if so what colour is the edging?

[Rollo]

I have only seen one 38 pained in this color scheme and it was a repaint of an original paint bike. I know why? But isn't my bike so.... Back to the issue of striping it did have white or off white striping between the blue and the silver tan. I only wish I had pics of the bike because even though he repainted the bike he had every scrape of documentation from the original owners wife. Even had his jacket, boots and leather pants as well as the payment books used by the dealer to document weekly payments. Traded a 26 JD at $15 for the $235 EL with the alligator seat and bags from the HD dealer in Cumberland MD. Some of the payments were as low as 5 cents but none over $2.50. Any way he repainted exactly as it had been and the few I have seen in pics were shown with the white stripe between the colors.

Tom (Rollo) Hardy
AMCA#12766

[Bruce T]

thanks Rollo, greatly appreciated. The growing consensus seems to be that there was an edging to the Sunshine Blue and that this was white or off white. I wonder why HD did not correct their publications back in 38?

[Rollo]

Just adds to the mystery!

Tom (Rollo) Hardy
AMCA #12766