Hi there everyone

I recently came across a Canadian Gilbert and Barker 176 and I am considering a full restoration. Luckily for me the pump still has an original Imperial Oil brass tag riveted to the back of said pump so I’m going to go with Imperial badges and globe on the restoration. My issue is this-

I read in Bob Lee’s book recently (10 gallons for a dollar) that G&B visibles we’re finished in red. I also remember reading somewhere that “all 176’s came off the assembly line in red” though I can’t recall the website that claimed that. Further to that point all magazine advertisements for Gilbert & Barker show red gas pumps. So when Imperial or texaco or anyone purchased these pumps did they generally leave them in red and just apply pump plates and globes for identification or did they do full repaint right away? I know that years later many of the pumps were repainted but what would the pumps have looked like on day 1?

Thanks for the help!

From all that I have heard, in the early days,all gas pumps, were red. That went for all manufacturers. I am sure fuel companies could have special ordered colors other than red but basically the one color worked. Simply a color of choice and warning of fuel volatility. Paul www.severngaspumps.com

Thanks Paul. Very interesting, I wonder if a company like imperial would bother paying up for custom colours upon ordering. I guess that would be (as you mentioned) up to the individual companies but being as red is one of Imperials 3 colours I would think that a red pump wouldn’t be offensive to them.

Thanks Paul

If you went to the local petroleum equipment company to purchase a pump the pumps that were in crates in the warehouse were painted red. Red was the standard color for gasoline, green was the color for oil. I believe the local company would repaint the pump for you.

If you purchased a pump directly from the pump company you could order it in the standard color "red." But you could have the pump painted any color you wanted for an additional cost, usually less than $2.00 per pump. Every company offered this option.

The first piece of literature created for a new pump was usually called a "Bulletin." I have every Bulletin printed by Tokheim and every pump shown in these Bulletins are in red, except for the special Bulletins that were prepared for companies such as Gulf and Tidewater.

Jack Sim

Awesome in Jack!

Humm all the pumps in the early days always painted red ? maybe there are exceptions, My original untouched Wayne model 492s the first layer of paint I see is green .

I've heard that the Romans were all green. The brochure I have has a green one on the front.

The majority of Tokheim visibles I get a hold of almost always have traces of red paint on the backs of the skins. G&B's are the same, traces of red in areas not exposed to the direct elements.

Woah, glad I came back to look for my thread. Cool info!

When you have over 500 pieces of original gas pump literature and each state the height, weight, etc., then it says "red" after color, you tend to believe the standard color of pumps coming from the companies is "red." There always exceptions as I mentioned above.
I did pull my eight page Wayne 490 series brochure I have and my four original ads for the "Greek" 490 pump, there is no mention of the color. It does mention that the pumps are "sprayed with a special metal primer and then finished with a special weather resisting paint" but again no color mentioned.

Jack