Best material for grille block?

[Sean T.]

Ok, so with the air dam gone, and the idea thrown in the garbage by mom and dad, I am going to look into grille blocks and covering the turn signal cavities.

(Plus with winter coming the grille bocks should help keep the engine warmer, right?)

I know that I need a clear material for over the turn signals so they will still be visible, and I would like to do the same for the lower grilles because I have repeating AM turn signals down there. The upper grille doesn't matter.

The only thing is that I would like it to be 100% removable without damaging the paint. The only things I can think of are packing tape (which will indent in the wind/snow and won't stay stick on in the cold/wet so no.) and plexiglass, but how would i go about attaching it, so that it can be removed? (and where do I get plexiglass)?

[Sean T.]

And to help: not the most recent pic, but the shape of the car hasn't changed so it will do for now.

[bbjsw10]

It is election time, which means free coroplast from the signs! Just stop by right after elections and grab some up. Or just go at night and grab the guys you don't want elected.

[Sean T.]

That is mentioned all the time on here, but unfortunately political signs are VERY rare here. They pop up on all the corners for city elections, but not for presidential/november elections. I think this entire year I've seen less than a dozen TOTAL, and that is my all-year total. (although I think I saw about a half-dozen more while I was up north on vaca.)

Plus, cloroplast isn't clear, so I can't use it over the turn signals.

[metroschultz]

I helped one of my friends use some black coroplast on her grill opening. Then we took the Blue Oval and attached it to the coroplast with double sided trim tape.



She covered the useless holes on the side with duct tape herself.
Just an idea,
Schultz

I got the coroplast at the sign shop near my house. It was $15 for a 4' X 8' sheet.

I would recommend Lexan for the lights. It lasts longer and is easier to work with than Plexiglas. I got mine from a plastic dealer in Norfolk. He actually gave me several pieces for free. They were scraps he was going to throw away.

[Geebee]

Sign writers and their suppliers carry Coroplast as well as plastic specialists.
Have a search of the forums and see if someone with the same car has done it and what they blocked/ how the temperature went, etc.

[DifferentPointofView]

I use thick clear plastic. You use clear packaging tape, and it hold on there really nice. If you need pics of what mine looked like before I ripped it off for summer I can give those to you. I call them, "steath blocks". You can't even tell that they are there most of the time, and they're really tough, so bugs and stuff don't put holes in them, and they don't stretch like my first surran wrap grille blocks. Really good. I think you can get it at hardware stores.

[brickinthewind]

For a removable grille opening, if you can find something behind it that is solid to attach a toggle bolt or a tumble toggle behind, or to run the folding end behind, you could drill some holes and use a washer under the head of the toggle bolt



Lexan or Coroplast could work, and you would just have to have something behind the opening that the folding part of the toggle would go behind. And when you remove it, be able to catch the toggle or at least find where it falls.

[Sean T.]

(Jeep guy, don't know your name) some pics would be great, and did it leave any residue on the paint or anything?

Hmm... didn't think about attaching them with those bolt thingys before, but I could probably attach it to the mesh grilles I have installed, they are designed like this (cutaway of the car):



(yeah, I suck at MS Paint) They are kind of clamped on there... The bottom ones are so large though, that I would be worried about it pulling on the mesh and bowing it out. That would work for the top grille because it's attached different... but not too sure about the bottom ones, and that won't work for the turn signals...

As for asking others, I am one of the very few on here that own a Taurus, and I'm the oldest active member that owns one. I did find one of these by my house the other day... Signs, Banners, Digital Printing, Decals, Labels @ FASTSIGNS® not sure if they would have scraps to give me though... they seem pretty professional and they don't have lexan as far as I can tell.

[DifferentPointofView]

I don't know if you can see it very well (which is a good thing if your going stealth But here it is. Ive got an upper and lower grille. the lower one doesn't have as good pics, but you can see what it kinda looks like. The plastic is very flexible, even though it looks like hard plastic on the bottom block.
1: top
2: top
3: bottom





As for sticky residue, I really didn't have any from the clear tape, The duct tape from my first prototypes really got something going. There was some residue, but it was pretty much clear, and it was easy to get off. I used it on grey plastic bumpers and chrome grille though, so I don't know how hard it is to get off paint.

Chrome cleaned well, plastic cleaned well, and headlights cleaned off good with plastx, but other than that, I don't know what to say. I don't have painted bumpers (really good for off-roading and ecomodding )