1981 Toyota Touch Up Paint (29 OEM Colors)

The 1981 Toyota Vibe

Welcome to 1981, the year Toyota decided "boxy" was a personality trait and the wedge-shaped Celica was the peak of aerodynamics. Whether you were hauling hay in a square-body Truck, cruising in a Cressida, or pushing a Tercel to its absolute limit, the look was unmistakable. This was the era of high-contrast style, and while we've tracked down the survivors, the real king of the lot is the iconic Two-Tone 391/202. That Red-over-Black combo was pure street-tough energy, turning a reliable commuter into something that looked like it belonged in a synth-wave music video.

Paint Health Check

Back in '81, Toyota was still firmly in the Single Stage Era. Unlike modern cars that have a "plastic" clear coat shield, your 1981 paint is a living, breathing layer of acrylic enamel where the pigment is right on top. The legend of Toyota reliability is bulletproof, but the paint? Not so much. If you rub your hand across the hood and it comes away looking like you've been playing with sidewalk chalk, you've got Oxidation. The sun is literally cooking the pigment out of the surface. Once that single stage goes "chalky," it's a race against time before the metal underneath starts dreaming of rust.

Restoration Tip

Because this is single-stage paint, you can't just ignore a chip and hope for the best. On these older Toyotas, a tiny nick in the paint is an open invitation for a rust party, especially around the wheel wells of the Trucks and Landcruisers. It needs wax or it dies. After you use our touch-up kit to seal those chips, keep the entire panel under a thick coat of high-quality wax. That wax acts as the "clear coat" your factory never gave you, locking in the color and keeping the oxygen from turning your red Supra into a pinkish-white ghost.