Colour Question

[jaedba2604]

Bit of a pointless one..in a way.

Does anyone know why BMW called their v dark matallic blue 'carbon black' and their metallic black 'sapphire black', there is a third dark metallic called 'ruby black'..which follows convention and has a reddish tinge.

what's your fave?

[Sub10]

Favourite?

The one you failed to mention.......Azurite Black.

[mmm-five]

My favourite is Ruby Black, that's probably why I bought one in that colour.

Can't help with the reasoning behind the colour names, but they've got to call them something better than 'black with hint of blue', 'black with hint of grey', and 'black with hint of red'.

[jaedba2604]

sorry, i meant that they appear to have carbon and sapphire the wrong way round...or am i being thick?

[Vee]

Probably because Sapphire was already around (from the mid-late 90s) whilst the Carbon was introduced around 2000 ?

[ChasW]

My 130i was Carbon black from memory and looked like a very dark blue. Attractive colour

[rumple]

Mines sapphire , stunning colour when polished up, mine could really do with claying then machine polishing to bring it out though. I just brought a black car, reading this is the first time I realised carbon was blue, I assumed it was a flat black

[M888SXY]

Mine is azurite black - blue bits, great in the sun.

Sub10 said:

Favourite?

The one you failed to mention.......Azurite Black.

[Mr Bimmer]

Let's not forget Jerez black. Similar to carbon black.

[Jobbo]

rumple said:

Mines sapphire , stunning colour when polished up, mine could really do with claying then machine polishing to bring it out though. I just brought a black car, reading this is the first time I realised carbon was blue, I assumed it was a flat black

Jet black is the flat black. Carbon might have a vaguely blue tinge in bright sunlight, but it's definitely black rather than blue. Metallic though, isn't it?

[Maxus]

My carbon black car looks black most of the time so is proberbly the best description for it. Mercedes had a similar version which they called blue black.

Ruby black is stunning.

[Jobbo]

Merc's blue black is much more like BMW's midnight blue.

[M888SXY]

And I'm sure my E46 Alpina was "cosmos" black.

[4rephill]

jaedba2604 said:

what's your fave?

181 Diamantschwarz: Diamond Black Metallic

(Like all black cars, looks fabulous for the 30 seconds it stays clean! )