What color should the Auto-lite horn be?

[squidtone]

Hi all,
I can't attack my tub yet, so I thought I'd get my Autolite horn working. I tested it (with 12V) and it didn't work, and it was rusty and ugly. I took it apart and found the points didn't conduct. Some robust sanding/polishing took care of that, and I sandblasted the rest. There were remnants of black paint on the "bell" of the horn, but I can't tell if the base (green primer in my picture) is supposed to be black, or was it simply zinc plating? If indeed it was zinc plating, I'll just paint that part silver.
Anybody know? (rather silly, but if I can duplicate stock colorings I'll make the effort)

And by the way, I made my own 0.8ohm "resistor" with some thick nichrome which I intend to put in series inside the horn to safely use it at 12 V.

[1955CJ-5]

I can't say that I "know" the answer, but here is a picture of my horn before I cleaned it up. Black over some red primer...no way to know if that was original though.

[squidtone]

Thanks '55,
Yah, I can see the black under the red there on the bell, but I guess I've convinced my self it was simple zinc plating on the heavy base part. So I just used silver paint.

I had a piece of 26 awg nichrome which is kind of light duty for the current involved so I simply doubled it, then cut a length that gave me 0.8 ohm, and put ceramic beads over it as a high temp insulator (it does heat up...afterall it's something like 30 watts there).  I de-soldered the lead inside the horn and put the new resistor in series to the lead of the coil.... it's all internal so no need for an ugly external ballast resistor...
I put it all together and adjusted the points position and the striker....IT SOUNDS GREAT! I was thrilled! But my wife just kinda rolled her eyes....I'm such a automotive nerd I guess...

[1955CJ-5]

The sound of the Willys/Autolight horn, along with the fan noise when the engine is running, are the signature sounds of a Jeep!

[Kirkski]

Nice job, looks great!