One of the most unique features of our Classic Cougars would have to be the beautiful die cast chrome trimmed grille. Unfortunately, time has not always been kind to these magnificent grilles so you may need to bring the beauty back. Don R. aka 67 Pace Cat has done a very nice job of sharing the steps he took to make his grill look great again. I owe Don an apology as I have been slow getting this up: Sorry about that Don and thanks again for sharing this with all of us.
After some careful dis-assembly of the grille shell I first removed the hinge plate from the back of the headlight door.
See all those peened over pegs? That is how many places that the chrome is attached. Apparently the designers wanted that to stay connected… Till the end of time.
With an angle grinder and a small 80 grit disk grind off all of the pegs. Be careful and go slow. The metal that you are removing is very soft.
Carefully tap all of the pegs from the back towards the front in sequence from one end. Avoid binding and stressing the grille. It will come out with a little encouragement. Send the grille to the chrome shop or spend some time on the buffing wheel like I did.
Continued.
After polishing I cleaned and masked off only the chrome edges of the grille with 1/8” masking tape and painted the parts that required black. I sandblasted and painted the headlight door and hinge. All of the black parts are painted with Duplicolor “Ford Satin Black” 500 degree engine paint. I use this paint for almost everything. I believe that the ceramic in the formula makes this paint more durable.
A little polishing and a new background and the Cat shines again.
Last step before reassembly: Leaving the chrome masked off, and after 24 hours dry time I masked off the black and painted the sides of the grille with “Flat Silver”. After another 24 hours dry time I unmasked and touched up the black with a paint pen from Hobby Lobby. Reassemble the grille back onto the headlight door and temporarily attach it with the 6 screws from the back. 3 of these will attach the hinge plate when you are all done. I used 2 part epoxy resin with a mixing syringe and applied a spot to the back of every one of the pins that I had ground off earlier.
Sorry, no pics of the back of the headlight doors after reassembly and the grille is already installed. Use the epoxy sparingly, it wont take much on each post (one drop). Since the posts are about half the size of the hole, the epoxy will sag into the void and fill the space. Too much and it may run out the front.
Thanks Grant. I am very happy with it so far. The color is Dupont “Orange Crush”. I had already settled on the color when I spotted another beautiful orange cougar (Local Hero) prowling Classiccougarcommunity.com! That sealed the deal and the car was sprayed.
I have photo-documented the build on my buddies facebook community page: Redirecting...
Oh brother…Bill?? Any way you can keep Mark from seeing this? We wouldn’t want to cause him any un-due cranial pressure, now, would we??? LMAO
Car is looking great, Don. No worries on the pics of the back of the doors, I was mainly interested out of curiosity. Don’t plan on tearing mine apart again any time soon!
and the grille is already installed. Use the epoxy sparingly, it wont take much on each post (one drop). Since the posts are about half the size of the hole, the epoxy will sag into the void and fill the space. Too much and it may run out the front.
