Topic: 71 Mach 1 silver paint

[Ashley]

Anyone know the paint code for the silver on hood and lower body for 71 Mach?   Thanks

[WT8095]

This sheet lists it as Light Silver Poly, 32520.

[J_Speegle]

Looked at the same paint chip chart - not sure if the light silver is the correct color. Reference on that sheet is for stripes not the lower panels or  hood.  Think the stripes are for other Ford models that year but the chart is not specific enough to be clear IMHO

Reasoning is that the black shown above that is not the black used on the hood blackout and lower body panels. That color is called out to the left of the list with the silver poly in it

Not certain that the silver poly is low gloss product

Been looking but don't have an alternate at this point. I think that Bob P posted a response to a similar request in one of his Mustang Monthly articles (restoration monthly feature)  long ago.

[WT8095]

Looked at the same paint chip chart - not sure if the light silver is the correct color. Reference on that sheet is for stripes not the lower panels or  hood.  Think the stripes are for other Ford models that year but the chart is not specific enough to be clear IMHO

Reasoning is that the black shown above that is not the black used on the hood blackout and lower body panels. That color is called out to the left of the list with the silver poly in it

Not certain that the silver poly is low gloss product

Been looking but don't have an alternate at this point. I think that Bob P posted a response to a similar request in one of his Mustang Monthly articles (restoration monthly feature)  long ago.

I'm not entirely certain, either. I've found various other forums that mention the light silver poly, but no corroborating documentation. The Mustang Attitude site show this paint code was also known as Silver Frost for 1966 & 1967 Mustangs. Silver Frost looks a lot like the silver '71 Mach I stripes, not that photos are the best way to compare.

The color code does not necessarily lock in the amount of sheen - the color could be made lower gloss for the hood by adding flattening agent. Was the lower body high gloss, or low-gloss?

[J_Speegle]

The color code does not necessarily lock in the amount of sheen - the color could be made lower gloss for the hood by adding flattening agent. Was the lower body high gloss, or low-gloss?

Not lock it in but the formula - unaltered sure does

The lower body panels were the same low/no gloss as the hood. 

Just leaning hard towards caution - don't want to recommend anything without some solid support

Not sure why Ditzler didn't include the color code with the black hood black out code

Ifs out there - just got to find it

[WT8095]

Here's a few more pieces of data. Did a bit more digging on Mustang Attitude and found Rinshed-Mason and DuPont chips.

R-M lists "Silver Irid.     170F10" for paint stripes and "Silver Irid.     171F11" for exterior trim. (Same name - different sheen, perhaps?)

DuPont lists "Silver Metallic     4733L"

MA cross-references PPG 32520 to DuPont 4733L. The R-M numbers are not cross-referenced in their database. Different R-M numbers are listed but I can't find chips for those.

Just above the Striping Colors section on the DuPont chart, there is this statement:
"To obtain a gloss comparable to the original finish, add approximately one ounce DuPont 45285 Flattening Compound to a pint of unreduced color."
That statement may apply only to the Interior section immediately above, it may not pertain to the striping section. The same statement appears on my 1968 DuPont chart, which does not have a Striping section, in which case it clearly applies to the Interior.

Still not conclusive, but interesting that there is agreement between PPG & DuPont.

[J_Speegle]

Still not conclusive, but interesting that there is agreement between PPG & DuPont.

Thanks for posting - guess that there is one or more pages that went with the DuPont page posted.


Not sure what you mean about the two pages agreeing. If its the color names it might just be that they took their information from the same source


Interesting that both ignored (just based on these two pages) the whole Mustang/Mach I  hood  and body treatment

[WT8095]

Not sure what you mean about the two pages agreeing. If its the color names it might just be that they took their information from the same source

See the attachments below. These are for 1966, but as far as I know the paint companies didn't change formulations for a given code number. For Ford paint code "4" (Silver Frost - Mercury called it Sheffield Silver that year), PPG lists 32520, and DuPont lists 4733-L. MA therefore lists them both as matches for Silver Frost, along with Ford code M1901. Not sure where they came up with the Ford code, it would be interesting to follow that trail. So, PPG and DuPont both list their "Silver Frost" numbers as the silver stripe color for 1971. They agree on that point, but of course that doesn't conclusively prove that this is the correct Mach I stripe color. They could both be incorrect. Or they could both be referring to something other than the hood and rocker panel treatment.

FYI both codes come up with the same matches in the carpaintonline.com database. ("4" for 1966, along with "M1901A" and several other codes through the 60s, 70s and into 1980)

Interesting that both ignored (just based on these two pages) the whole Mustang/Mach I  hood  and body treatment

DuPont and PPG refer to stripes. Is the hood paint a "stripe" to them? Is the rocker panel paint a "stripe"? Perhaps - not the term most people would use though. Rinshed-Mason uses "stripe" but they also use "exterior trim colors" (with a different code than their "stripe" color). So maybe they did ignore it, or maybe they just didn't worry about semantics.

I think the best next step would be for Ashley to get one of these color chips from ebay or a swap meet, and see how they compare to a car with original silver hood/rocker paint. Or get a fresh sample of one of the two colors from carpaintonline.com. Probably not a very easy task to find an original-paint vehicle to compare to, and paint on a vehicle and paint chips can change over time too. The only other alternative I can think of at the moment is to contact Ford and/or the paint companies to see if they have any additional information in their databases or archives.

For the record, I'm not claiming that any of these codes are a definitive match. My intent is to provide the data I've found and point out consistencies and inconsistencies that will hopefully provide leads for further research.