diff --git a/solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/schema/DateField.java b/solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/schema/DateField.java
index e923ab87cf3..9d85a2a291c 100644
--- a/solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/schema/DateField.java
+++ b/solr/core/src/java/org/apache/solr/schema/DateField.java
@@ -256,7 +256,7 @@ public class DateField extends FieldType {
    * Thread safe method that can be used by subclasses to format a Date
    * using the Internal representation.
    */
-  public static String formatDate(Date d) {
+  protected String formatDate(Date d) {
     return fmtThreadLocal.get().format(d);
   }
 
diff --git a/solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/schema/DateFieldTest.java b/solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/schema/DateFieldTest.java
index a34f2f6ae5d..084637b383d 100644
--- a/solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/schema/DateFieldTest.java
+++ b/solr/core/src/test/org/apache/solr/schema/DateFieldTest.java
@@ -198,7 +198,7 @@ public class DateFieldTest extends LuceneTestCase {
 
   protected void assertRoundTrip(String canonicalDate) throws Exception {
     Date d = DateField.parseDate(canonicalDate);
-    String result = DateField.formatDate(d) + "Z";
+    String result = DateField.formatExternal(d);
     assertEquals("d:" + d.getTime(), canonicalDate, result);
 
   }