1965 Mustang for sale

I found a 1965 Mustang for sale. Looking at the pictures there appears to be red oxide on the underside where paint has worn away? I remembered posts where members discussed red oxide on the underside of the car and it seemed to be a difference of opinion whether red oxide was used or not.

https://www.classic-trader.com/uk/cars/listing/ford/mustang/mustang-289/1965/33677

For sure the early Mustangs had red oxide primer. They never really painted the underside of any mustang body color just overspray and the hit and miss undercoating. The 71-73 were Slop grey. Some say there was red oxide but I have never seen one in looking at them for 45 years. I never say never could be an early car out of Fords custom shop that did not go down the regular paint line so you never know what left Ford.

If you look close at low mileage cars you will see about a 3 inch diameter circle around the big holes in the bottom of the frame rails. That is were the body went down the assembly line on it's fixture. The rest points did not get paint due to that.

The transition from red oxide occurred during the 70 model year from my understanding. You would see red oxide on pre-70 built cars. I have heard some other indications that Dearborn started the slop gray first and then it progressed to other plants. There may be some 70 Dearborn cars with slop gray on them. I do not have any evidence to lean on for that.

From what I've seen, in 71-73 cars, it is slop but, "grey" may be mis-leading. My 72 was a medium blue with a modest amount of metallic, hence the term slop. I spent a significant amount of time to verify this. The MCA is not right about everything. Chuck

From what I've seen, in 71-73 cars, it is slop but, "grey" may be mis-leading. My 72 was a medium blue with a modest amount of metallic, hence the term slop. I spent a significant amount of time to verify this. The MCA is not right about everything. Chuck

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I agree with your thought Chuck. I spent considerable time addressing the underbody on my current restoration. With it being an AZ driven car most of its life and know ing that it spent at least 15+ years in dry storage, when I got it, it was simply a matter of removing the built up desert dust/dirt to find virgin coatings underneath. In my case it was a slop black as well, much of the underbody had excessive factory applied sound proofing. I have been told by some self-professed experts that my undercarriage should not be black and that the underside of our cars with standard interiors did not receive soundproofing. Hogwash... I use MCA strictly as a guideline, as I don't feel they are really experts when it comes to '71-3 Mustangs... there are a few in the MCA.

To each their own...

Well...here are a couple pics of my original 73 Mach with 95k miles and it was clearly red oxide.

First pic shows after I removed gas tank and no doubt there...

Second pic shows when I started to remove the factory undercoat and you can see the red oxide coming through...