Topic: 68 GT grille color

[ruppstang]

Yes there were hard tape lines. I have been told that the idea of the two tone grill was the make the running horse appear to be floating in the grill.

A side note, the 68 GTCS and HCS grills mesh are all dark argent with no corrals or running horse.

[TLea]

Thanks again

[J_Speegle]

 Past threads

https://www.concoursmustang.com/forum/index.php?topic=931.msg5076#msg5076

https://www.concoursmustang.com/forum/index.php?topic=2374.15

[TLea]

The threads link by Jeff seemed indicate it?s more of a blue gray color? I think of dark argent as a gray black color like the 70 mustang rockers.
NPD has a color but it seems like it?s more for 67 grills?

[ruppstang]

Here is a picture of our unrestored 68 HCS. The dark argent has faded over the years but is clearly not blue grey. In my opinion the 65 cars used a blue grey. I have a original portion of a 67 grill and it is not a real blue grey either. I will try to post a picture of it latter.

[J_Speegle]

When the discussion is done I'll be merging two of these threads (one being this one) so that new, updated findings and opinions are combined with the older possibly dated information to keep things all together

Trying to think if I have a good picture from an angle that shows the color and difference in the paint colors

[ruppstang]

Here is the sample of the original 67 grill color. It is defiantly a different color than in my 68 GT grill. It makes more sense to me that Ford would have the 68 dark argent on the GT grill rather than using the standard 67 grill color. May be others with original GTs will post some pictures to compare.   

[Kascus]

I have been reading past post about the color of the 68 GT grill inside of the large corral. I can?t find any agreement on which color closely matches the original.Some say it has a blue metallic tint while others say it?s a darker grey metallic with no blue tint. Does anyone have a link to a color chart or spray can of it?
Thanks

[carlite65]

what specific year are you asking about?

[Kascus]

1968

[J_Speegle]

There is an established thread that merged a number of threads on the subject. Found them by using the words "68 GT Grill" in the search tool

Going to merge this thread with that one to keep these together

Just to help there is a related thread that touches on both GT and non-GT grills

https://www.concoursmustang.com/forum/index.php?topic=2374.msg12395#msg12395

[Kascus]

Thanks guys, the paint mix code from Ruppstang was exactly what I needed.

[Anghelrestorations]

Adding some photos here of what I think the correct look for a 68 grill would be based on an unrestored grill I have and a new one I just refinished to match this week.  Hard to get the photos and lighting just right but in general the difference in colors should be very subtle.  If you are standing 10 feet away you would not really notice, and if you do, then the colors are not correct.

For the rivets I myself prefer to see the natural rivets when you open the hood for that contrast.  I dont believe that all grills came with them being natural and have seen some where it is mixed and matched on the same grill - natural and dark but I prefer to see the time and effort taken to change out the rivets so you can see that.

Original unrestored grill:
20231025_121712 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr

20231025_121708 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr

20231025_102857 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr



Taped off areas:
20231025_185838 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr



End result:
20231109_105741 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr

20231107_123453 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr

20231110_170923 by Marcus Anghel, on Flickr

[ruppstang]

FYI the argent painted center was only for the GT and sprint grills. The standard grills are all black.

[dave6768]

Here was my attempt using 67 grill color.

(I have since put in the correct color lights)