well,
i need some ideas to make a pair of front grills for my 77.... reason being is that when i molded in my front bumper, i had to cut the bumper in three parts to get everything to line up right and then had to put everything back togther..... since i had to do that, my grills won't fit right in the holes...i was thinking of an alunimum plate with perferated holes in it.....that would be cool.....i also have to make a custom valence panel since that wouldn't fir either......that will be aluminum also....... anyone have any nice front grill picks... i've seen the one with the full grill with horizontal bars..i think it was a white vette...


b

 

Instead of making a piece of "swiss cheese" sheet metal. Put 2 verticle pieces of any type of metal you like, notch them and then put 3 or 4 horizontal pieces.

 

Look at my site, it's a '72 so was a chrome bumper 3 piece grill, but I did a one piece alumuminum weld up, with my buddy the welder who did the actual fab work...

GENE

 

WOW

 

maybe something like this?

 

yuck ricer wire mesh

 

actually if that was in black id like it,the silver stands out too much.

 

Get some stock aluminum, cut, sand, and build your own. Make a jig to hold everything and find someone who can weld aluminum.







Also, plan out the mounting brackets too.

 

I've been wondering how it would look with no grill... the shelbys pull it off, but then again you can admire the radiator and nice stainless lines they run up right beside the opening!

 

thats pretty cool.......good work

 

I love 74roadsters grille,i might have to look into making one.

 

I love it too. Think you might could share some specs with us?

 

Looks like you cut out the center part am i right?I have my front bumper off right now,i didnt paint it on the car today so i can still modify it to make the grille like yours.Let us know more info.thanks

 

i'll have to mess with it once i get my front rebuild done........i sort of like the mesh and the full bar grills......got me thinking now

b

 

I had a great e:mail written up and saved because lots of people e:mailed me, but the file is long gone.

In a nut shell . . .

1. I modified the lower bumper brackets to provide a flat surface at the right angle. Forum member MIKER helped quite a bit, he has a plasma cutter.

2. I cut out the center of a fiberglass nose and glassed the missing lip. Lots of additional body work getting it to fit my car etc. Epoxy, prime, paint, wetsand and buff.

3. I made a wood template of the nose opening edge. The leading edge is not a straight line. I used the wood to make a 2D Autocad drawing of the part base don the template. I took the template and drawing file to a fabricator AST Waterjet in Irving TX. They rough cut the bars for me.

4. I clamped all the bars together and grinded/sanded the edges smooth so they all matched perfectly.

5. I then rounded the edge on each bar sanding by hand.

6. After all of the bars were shaped, I sanded each one with 220, 320, 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500 & finally 2000. Follow up with a quick rub down with Mother's aluminum polish and you have a mirror shine.

7. I built a wood jig to hold the bars so another guy could weld them to 2 mounting brackets and 2 additional support brackets.

8. After getting it back, I secured it to the lower bracket supports then drilled and tapped 4 holes.

Still to do . . have brackets added to mount the factory turn signals and paint the grille semigloss black and clean/polish only the leading edge.

The guy who welded the aluminum scraped a couple bars and because of my open jig, several of the bars have a slight warp to them. I should have built a wood jig in sandwich fashion, aluminum bar, solid wood bar (correct spacing thickness), aluminum bar etc.

I used 1/8" thick material and should have gone thicker. I spaced the bars to match the simulated grille bars on turn signals and should have spaced them tighter.

I know I'm nit-picking, but I want perfection.

 

In a nut shell ... you did some pretty extensive posts as I recall.
They must still be in the archives somewhere....

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/sear...earchid=657737

That's one hell of a project. 2 thumbs up for seeing it through.