safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

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safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby rustytoolss » Wed Jun 14, 2017 7:19 pm

While back I saw a post about not using dark colors to paint the exterior of your Foamie. The dark color adsorbed a lot of the suns heat, and the foam "may" get soft.
Soon I should be painting my Foamie. I was thinking of painting the body a Harvest Gold/tan type color/ and doing some color of Green as accent trim . Would you guys think that these would be safe color choices ? It get's hot in Ohio...but not like Arizona or New Mexico.
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby GPW » Thu Jun 15, 2017 5:10 am

Rusty , no worries …. we measured the temperature of different colors with one of those IR/Laser thermometers and even black only got to ~ 140F in our Hottest summer day … Not near enough to soften the foam , but enough expand any dents ... ;)
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby Don L. » Thu Jun 15, 2017 6:06 am

I'm curious how hot a car would get with your thermometer?

A nice thing about foamies is they don't get hot or radiate heat like cars do. The foam can't build up heat and hold it like an auto does.
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby me&z » Thu Jun 15, 2017 8:27 am

Don L. wrote:I'm curious how hot a car would get with your thermometer?

A nice thing about foamies is they don't get hot or radiate heat like cars do. The foam can't build up heat and hold it like an auto does.



Cars get very hot, very quickly. Decades ago I was an engineer working on vehicle HVAC systems. Part of the testing was to "hot soak" the vehicle to 140F in the sun, jump in as quickly as possible, and drive with the windows up until the AC cooled off the interior while taking measurements. NOT FUN! I never had to do a cold soak test.

* Reflective sunscreens help a lot but mostly they just slow down the time to reach peak temperature
* Leaving a window open even just a little helps by providing a path for heated air to escape but doesn't prevent an unsafe rise in temperatures
* Parking so the the car is shaded or the least amount of window faces into the sun helps (that might mean the front windshield if it has a sun screen, it might be the rear window of a minivan or SUV because of the angle).
* When you get into a hot car, open all windows, and blast the FAN at high speed.
(You want to push air through the vents to pull off as much stored heat as you can)
* Until the vehicle is near the outside temp, the "max AC" isn't going to help. It just recirculates the interior air. Doesn't make you cooler until that air is below the outside air.

NONE OF THESE TRICKS MAKES IT SAFE TO LEAVE A PET, A CHILD, OR PERSON INCAPABLE OF GETTTING OUT ON THEIR OWN IN A CLOSED VEHICLE. Just don't do it. Even on a "cool" day, the interior of a vehicle can reach dangerous temperatures in a surprisingly short time.

I'll get off my soapbox now. But I'm very passionate about hot car dealths because they are preventable.
Last edited by me&z on Thu Jun 15, 2017 8:37 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby me&z » Thu Jun 15, 2017 8:35 am

Doesn't appear that this site has been updated since 2015. But the charts appear to be reasonable.

http://heatkills.org
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby mikeschn » Thu Jun 15, 2017 6:09 pm

Here's how much the different colors affect your temperature...

http://tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?p=705130#p705130

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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby GPW » Fri Jun 16, 2017 5:01 am

190F …??? We never saw our measurements that high , but I don’t doubt it … that may be a bit Too HOT as that’s the temp we use to Bend foam ... :frightened:

Speaking of colors , Back in the late 70’s when we spent a lot of time hanging around my brother’s auto body shop, it was generally agreed that (FOR Cars) a light Blue was the best color as it was cooler to the touch , but generated enough heat to burn off moisture , and was the longest lasting color( most resistant to fading ) … But that was then , this is now , so we better “Test" all this , see what’s really happening in our area…

Are we thinking about a “yeti” trailer ??? :thinking:
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby Papi » Tue Jun 27, 2017 2:20 pm

I originally painted mine hunter green. It was so hot in the summer we couldn't touch it! It didn't seem to make it any hotter inside, but it sure sizzled in the summer on the outside. I repainted it white and it stays reasonable.
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Re: safe colors on Foamie exterior ?

Postby rustytoolss » Tue Jun 27, 2017 8:35 pm

Papi wrote:I originally painted mine hunter green. It was so hot in the summer we couldn't touch it! It didn't seem to make it any hotter inside, but it sure sizzled in the summer on the outside. I repainted it white and it stays reasonable.

Thanks, good to know. I was thinking of a caramel color with green stripes. What do you think ?
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