Yeah, so...shoot me! hehehe I do work on Chevys sometimes I did this nose job for a 17-year old kid a few weeks ago and just now taking time to post a couple pics. The Carriage Works phantom grille is pretty cool, but you gotta watch those instructions that come with it. He got the parts for Christmas last year and he didnt think he could install it becauce he didnt understand the instructions. Neither did I! The grille came with 1/4" allen bolts and nuts that were supposed to be used as headlight anchors. Unfortunately, and as anyone knows that had installed headlights, the slots in a bucket arent designed to work with a regular bolt. With the headlights installed, whether their way OR the way I did it, the headlight lense sits against the backside of the grille and I suppose a good hard bump would break the lenses. Also, the only way to change a blown headlight is to remove the entire grille and surround. Problem solved with Hagan Snake-eye halogen headlights. The lens is near flat, and the bulb changes from the backside. The instructions said to totally remove the welded original headlight brackets, hold the headlight bucket in the hole and mark where the adjustcing screws need to be. As previously mentioned, the hardware that came with the kit was cheesy at best and wasnt going to work very well. I knew if I did it that way, I'd see the truck back with the headlights falling out. Solution was to drill the remove the original brackets, trim them to fit flush on the surface of the core support, and weld them back on. This way, all the original hardware was utilized and the lights would stay where you put them. The original parking lights were removed and riveted to the core support in the location where the original wires came through. The hole was already large enough to allow the bulb socket through and let the backside of the housing sit on the surface of the core support. The lenses were then taped and painted to cover all but the forward-facing part of the lense. The hood latch was no longer accesible once the grille was installed, unless of course you are 12 years old. The bars are entirely too close together for normal adult fingers to go between. I solved that by adding a foot-operated latch at the bottom of the center support. As long as your foot fits between the bumper and the ground, you can unlatch the hood. Okay, pictures!
About that latch...i guess it doens't hang down too much? Might be a problem on low trucks, going fast, hut a bump, hood flys open.
hehehe...naw. Good point though! it sits about 1 1/2" above the bottom edge of the bumper. I had that in mind when I made the handle! Might be a bit too much for a 17 year old to suddenly be looking at a mashed windshield and a bright red hood, while trying to brake down from 70 mph! Been there, done that, got a tattoo. Well, actually its a scar! Ray
The Jalopy Journal
