Grille Repair: Was Glue This.......

[JOE FULTON <piper_pa20@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mr. AMC wrote:

...I had one area that was warped and that was where
they made a spot to reach
in under the hood to release the hood latch, the
material was just to thin. I
picked up some 1/2" square plexi glass at the local
plexi place friday and made 
me a re-enforcement for the back of this area after I
clamped the grill and
used the wife's hair drier as a heat gun to remove as
much of the warpage as
possible. I glued the piece of plexi glass in with JB
Weld. Before gluing the
plexi in I used my battery powered Dremil to grove the
plexi to make it fit the 
curve of the back of the grill. Tomorrow I will start
to glue in the mounting
tabs I made from scratch to mount the headlight door
screws which were missing. 
I also need to make a few re-enforcements in the grill
that factory should have 
put in but didn't. ...

--------> Doc, I am looking at the exact same thing on
my 69 Javelin grille. On 
that one, the bottom part is warping very slightly
upwards, where some of the
tabs broke. I was considering something very much like
what you are doing here. 
Are you talking about 1/2 inch square bar stock, or
sheet? Let us know how this 
fix works out, as I doubt I'm the only Javelin owner
with this problem, and
grilles for those cars start around 400 for really bad
ones. I've seen one guy
asking $2,000 for NOS.  It's still just a 37 year old
piece of plastic. After
nearly 40 years of drying out, I bet if you take it
out of the box it looks
just like mine. I'd love to hear some updates as time
goes by if any of this
cracks, etc. This grille stuff is a public service,
and thank you for it.
mike


Mike and Doc:
There was an excellent article about repairing a
grille (plastic, like AMC) on a Cuda in an issue of
Mopar Muscle a couple of years ago.  It was written by
Steve Dulcich who is one of the most "hands on"
magazine contributors in the business today.  Steve
specifies the adhesives he used and shows how to
rebuild broken tabs with pieces of sheet metal.  I
would be glad to find this article and make copies for
all you want it.  Mike, I'll stick a copy in that last
box of parts you bought.  Email me off list if you
want a copy.   
Regards,
Joe Fulton
Salinas, CA