Topic: 69 NJ Buck Tag

[Brian Conway]

     This is a Marti Buck Tag for my 69 car.  I also have the ' Mustang and COUGAR Tagbook ' by Marti.  With the help of the book I have deciphered most of the tag.  The paint code still needs a little help.  I don't think the tagbook explains this very well so a l am asking for a little help ?  Second line, after the VIN, T  CARD  RED  are the codes in question.  The car is a T5 Candyapple Red car with a black out hood and Black interior.  Thanks,  Brian

[Mike_B_SVT]

Cardinal Red?

Not sure if it is the same color as Candyapple Red or not.

[Brian Conway]

Well that got me thinking and how this for a reach.  primer or a undercoat color ?  Brian

[Coralsnake]

It  does stand for "Cardinal Red"  and its the same as Candyapple Red.

Primers and undercoats are not called out on buck tags, unless you have paint delete car ( there were only a handful of these)


I'm not sure why the plant used the name "Cardinal", but it is consistent with original tags I have seen. It's more commonly associated with Mercurys.

The codes and names vary year to year and even within a year.

I will look, I think I might have an original example....

Pete

[Brian Conway]

     That's interesting stuff Pete thanks.  The ' T ' Mustang paint code for 69 was Candyapple Red and the Cardinal Red was not a standard Mustang Offering.  So looks like Mike, with his Mercury background, was onto something ?  I sent Marti Auto Works an email last week asking this same question.  May not hear back from them soon so I thought you guys might be another good source of info.  Brian

[Coralsnake]

I think you are going to find it is just the terminology they chose.

There were no Cougars built in NJ, so it makes it even more curious.

I studied these tags for years, before Kevin wrote the book ( with the Ford records )

They cant be ciphered intuitively.  During production they changed.  I have seen 68 tags with DSO codes and occasionally strange notations like "COBRA JET"

Sometimes codes present at the beginning disappear, other times codes seem to appear mid-year.  Then there are codes that just change....

It must have been a challenge to keep track of them on the lines.

I just saw a 1968 on eBay with no option codes. That was the first time I saw that.

If you search the color data bases, Cardinal Red and Candyapple have all the same codes. It may have to do with where the paint was sourced? just a wild guess....


http://paintref.com/cgi-bin/colorcodedisplay.cgi?type=sample&ditzler=71528&syear=1968&smanuf=Ford&smodel=Mustang&sname=Cardinal%20Red&name=1968_00157_01

[Brian Conway]

     Thanks for sharing your past experience with these tags.  I copied a tag and Marti report off of ebay back in Feb. 2013 because it was close to my cars date.  That tag has the same sort of paint code as my car; T  CARD RED.  The Marti, for that car, states T5 Candyapple Red same as mine.  This car was built 1/27/69 at Metuchen and has an earlier rotation number.  So " intuitively " trying to figure these tags could pose a problem.  Brian

[J_Speegle]

As has been suggested before decoding the buck tags from any of the plants required that one focus on a very narrow area around the cars and plant built about the same time. Managers of the plants describe changing the codes every so often by simply adding a new page to a couple of peoples pocket decoders. Also I don't think the Cardinal Red is that odd of a thing since we IMHO are not only talking about painters and code stampers (of the buck tag) who were only building Mustangs but trucks, full size cans and "compacts"

Since these tags for in house use only, the plant could have chosen to use the term "Watermelon" (a bit extreme but you get the idea)  had they chose to as long as cars got painted the color was is suppose to be

Biggest mistake I've seen of projects for decoding these tags is the cross usage from other plants, and time periods.

Many many years ago I sponsored a project were we collected a bunch of buck tags and car information and simple reproduced it all as a collection and sent it back out to participants do use for their personal research. Project was titled The Unofficial   Buck Tag  Chain Letter. 70 printed pages of information Published about 13 years ago

[Brian Conway]

...and another buck tag with the same anomaly.  So it seems the Ford, Metuchen at least, assembly line had their own methods for reading the Buck Tag instructions.  Thanks for the help and input.  I suppose the buck tags are more car art than a means to verify any sort of originality.  Brian

[jwc66k]

...and another buck tag with the same anomaly.  So it seems the Ford, Metuchen at least, assembly line had their own methods for reading the Buck Tag instructions. 

Of course. Every one of the three Ford Assembly plants used different methods to make Mustangs. Why do you think that "plant" and "month" (along with other criteria) are stressed by Jeff in figuring out an answer. Remember, Ford was NOT making a Concours grade Mustang.
Jim

[Brian Conway]

     I really do appreciate the  advice, suggestions and helpful tips.  I am sure it has been noticed that all the tags posted are from the same plant and are all within the first 6 months of production.  Of course not all are from the same day or week.  Just trying to satisfy my own curiosity.  Brian

[Rusty]

My buck tag says the same thing on my Candyapple Red 69 Mach 1. The car was built Nov 1, 68.

[GT500KR]

Interesting thread, let me throw another hunch in there.

Since there were no Mercurys built at that plant, they may have had no knowledge of Cardinal Red. "CARD" may instead be a made-up acronym  for CandyAppleReD. They then added RED to make it less confusing??

Not any crazier than some of the other abbreviations that were used......

[Rusty]

Interesting thread, let me throw another hunch in there.

Since there were no Mercurys built at that plant, they may have had no knowledge of Cardinal Red. "CARD" may instead be a made-up acronym  for CandyAppleReD. They then added RED to make it less confusing??

Not any crazier than some of the other abbreviations that were used......

I agree. Seems most likely to me that it's simply an abbreviation for the paint color name.

[J_Speegle]

I think you are going to find it is just the terminology they chose................................
They cant be ciphered intuitively.  During production they changed. ................................Sometimes codes present at the beginning disappear, other times codes seem to appear mid-year.  Then there are codes that just change....

Have talked to plant managers from the 60's about the "coding" of the buck tags and the one what choose to share offered the following - likely was the same or similar at other plants.

It was up to the manager to choose the codes and the stamping to get the cars built.  At his plant specific workers were provided with a small pocket size stack of pages that included the codes for that year/period with a think cardboard cover and back page (similar thickness of the back of a paper tablet or slightly thinner) with a hold punched in the upper left hand corner and one of those brass push through retainers with the two legs we all use to use back in school. During the production year codes changed and the process changed, adjusted, new features or models were added or eliminated. When this happened he would simply hand out a page with the new info and the worker would replace the old page with the new one and apply the changes


Just sharing