Hi I have a 1994 Mk1 that Is in need of some paintwork as the previous owner must have painted it with a Cauliflower using Humbrol enamel which is slowly peeling off in places.
The paint code on the Vin Plate is SU Red.
But when I look at the Colour swatch in Halfords, SU Red doesn’t match the red my Mazda obviously left the Factory in. Does anyone know if there were different shades of SU Red?
There was supposedly a “light” and a “dark” SU red. Maybe get your paintwork cut back, to achieve a better match.
Go to any reputable car paint supplier and they will scan the colour and then mix the paint accordingly.
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All of the reputable paint suppliers I have used, look up the paint mix on the computer. Not one have I seen gone out into the carpark to take a spectrophotometric reading for a £10 aerosol. I’ve seen it written that they do, but they don’t.
I took my rear bumper off the Mk1 I owned to have it resprayed, the guy matched it perfectly with no trouble but that was brilliant black. He had a Mk1 in for work telling me he’ll have to respray the whole car as he just couldn’t match the paint to look anything like decent, so many different shades already on the car, that was red.
I had some PZ black mixed up. I asked the paint guy what went into it. Black apparently.
I’m not sure if all aerosols work the same but Twilight Blue Mica does not match when sprayed using an aerosol.
A fellow behind the counter in my local paint specialist motor factor explained that it was to do with the pressure it comes out of the can at.
Professionally sprayed paint matched perfectly from the factory paint code.
Hope you find something that works 
Thanks for all the useful replies, it is a dark red shade of SU I’ve discovered. I’ve also decided to bite the bullet and prep for a respray, I’ll prep it myself so I can find any rust hiding and get that sorted as well. But having a local body shop I have used before actually spray it.
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SU is the code for classic red.
I’ve owned several SU red mk1’s over the years and have used a local (to me) well established automotive paint and spray equipment supplier for each of them over those years. Each time, I was given 4 or 5 paint ‘swatches’ for me to go out to the car park and select the best match, in natural light. They all had a separate identifier and were mixed accordingly. Not unreasonable to expect 25-30 year old Mazda paint to have weathered a bit. Always had great success. Halfords was never a good match for me TBH.
EDIT: Absolutely no idea where OP is located? This is the place I referred to though,
AutoPaint Northern
4B Union Rd, Liversedge WF15 7HW
Barrie