Make me a grill | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

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Make me a grill

Scotts96sploder

Well-Known Member
Joined
February 10, 2019
Messages
258
Reaction score
83
City, State
Jacksonville FL
Year, Model & Trim Level
96 Explorer 5.0 rwd
had a rainy weekend so I could only do bench work. Decided to change up my grill. As I was working on it I realized I would need hood pins... oops, so I ordered some, it will all be done this week.
My plan was to have the metal part look rusted, and then I wanted the whole thing rusty looking, didn’t like the color of the primer so I just blacked it out with more bed liner.
There is a issue with these style hood pins if you want to use them. They are about 1/4” short where I am running them. So I’m going down to fasten all today to find some m12 tee nuts to give it a little extra bite. Also waiting on my buddy to loan me the two hole saws.

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I like how your Grill looks. Do you have a write up or Closer pics of how you did that with the Grill? I am talking about the Center piece.
 






I don't know why but I feel for the bench
 






Why did you need he hood pins?
 






Because it's cool ;)
 












Finished it. Um no I didn’t do any kind of write up. Basically I had some left over expanded metal and I just formed it to the inside of the plastic grill, then I J&B welded the **** out of it. I used a cutoff wheel to open the grill, and then sanded down to the line. Yeah there is a line in the grill like they made it to be cut out! I used some epoxy on the outer trim where it screws together, just to get everything straight, then sand and paint. Actually sand, glue, sand more then paint.

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I like how your Grill looks. Do you have a write up or Closer pics of how you did that with the Grill? I am talking about the Center piece.
Zoomed in for you. That’s the best I got unless I take it back apart.

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That looks awesome thank you. I will be planning to do the same thing. It looks great.
 






I don’t think you’d need hood pins. The Mounty grills are closed and you don’t need anything tools to open them.
 






Well I already installed them and removed the factory latch. Actually thinking of making a steel cover with magnetic cups built in to replace the factory plastic radiator cover/hider/airflow thing.
 












I don’t think you’d need hood pins. The Mounty grills are closed and you don’t need anything tools to open them.

Yep, you change out the safety latch from a Mounty...
 






Yep, you change out the safety latch from a Mounty...
I didn’t realize they were different. Weird manufacturing choice. The Mounty latch would work on both, you’d think they’d just use the one.
 






@Mbrooks420 - I didnt realize myself until I swapped a complete Mounty headlight assembly/front end to my Explorer...I shut the hood to enjoy the moment :bounce:...then realized I needed a long screwdriver through the grill to pull the latch :oops:
 






For kicks:

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See latch handle in Grill:
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Mountaineer Grill - hard to get to that latch! :)
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Love that Mountaineer front end though.
 






I don't understand the difficulty in getting to the hoodlatch. The main latch is released from in the cab, and the secondary is reached between the hood and the top of thr grill, not through the grill.
 






I don't understand the difficulty in getting to the hoodlatch. The main latch is released from in the cab, and the secondary is reached between the hood and the top of thr grill, not through the grill.
I think it changed in 1998. Thinking back to my 96, I think it was through the grill. They probably switched over to the Mountaineer style to cut down on stock parts.
 



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Ahh... Now that woukd make sense.
 






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