Check out my latest mod =D

[General Stalin]

So, I finally got that grille I wanted.

For those of you who remember my story about the deer I hit, I finally rebuilt my front end from that. I got a new grille and bumper. I have before and after pictures (and pictures of the deer)

BEFORE:

AFTER:

DEER:

And before you all ask, YES, that IS a crack on the very bottom of the new grille.... it broke while I was putting it on and I'm very angry and frustrated about it. the grille is going to have to come off again in the near future for some touching up anyway, so I'm going to patch that up (anyone have any suggestions about how to patch it up?)

So anyway, what do you all think? The whole truck will be flat black this year sometime along with the grille, because as you can see, it came gloss black in from the warehouse.

 

[bigblackhoe98]

Looks good! Did you have to move the lights back to make them fit behind the grill?
I'm surprised you didn't have more damage from hitting a deer! Tahoe's are tough!

 

[General Stalin]

Yeah tell me about it. It was the most amazing thing when I hit it. I was going kind of fast (I was on a back road with a friend at 3:303 in the morning.) I was going like 40 - 45 and WHAM. I t was a perfect hit. The truck was fine. It didn't even really "react" at all the to the fact that I just nailed a 120+ lb. object. I just felt the "thud" and the truck kept moving the same speed with all the lights still on haha.

But anyway, no the lights required no modification which was very cool. I few phantom grilles come with "light recess kits," but this one just bolts right on. You do have to attach the lower marker lights before you put the grille on, though.

 

[sasquatch094]

looks sweet dude, whered u get it at? bcuz i know i had several convos with you trying to figure out which one and everything.. price on that bad boY? thats the phantom right?

 

[mross]

looking good,my hoe is hit in the similar place by deer,except my deer got the fender,grille,and bumper

 

[JKmotorsports]

Looks good man. I like it. I bet you were extremely PO'ed when the new grille broke. Still looks good though. You may be able to lay a piece of metal strap across the back side with some epoxy to hold it together. Looks like the break is clean enough that you wouldn't notice once you put the two pieces together.

 

[sasquatch094]

how did it actually happen? was the bumper in a weird spot where u couldnt get the grille down under or what>

 

[foreverfalcon40]

Expoxy and paint over

 

[General Stalin]

Well, the grille is made by T-Rex, and it's a custom full plastic shell with the aluminum billet inserts pre-installed. I ended up getting it off of Billet anything and it was $510 =X.

And get this, my girlfriend bought it for me as a Christmas present.... AND she bought me the bumper which was another $213 beans. Yeah, she is amazing. She is not rich by any stretch of the imagination, she just happens to have a few credit cards that she is generous with.

Anyway, it broke while I was clipping the bottom of the grille into place. Stupid me thought that it would have been a better idea to screw in the top of the grille then get the bottom straightened out after. The main reason I did this was because I actually didn't think that the grille would mate with the plastic bumper gap filler piece that it clips into. My filler piece (as you can see in the before pics) was shattered, so I nabbed one off of a '94 suburban at the junkyard that morning when I did the install. When I was lining up the bottom of the grille to it, it didn't seem like the clips lined up with the clips on the grille. I figured I wasn't going to let that stop me and got the top screwed down and tried to get the bottom flush. The bottom of the grille was sticking out so I gingerly tried to pursuade the two ends of the grille downward (I applied decent pressure with my palm on either end of the grille while it "popped" into place). It seemed to snap into the place... then I noticed the middle was popped out still X_X. The clip right in the middle of the grille was a VERY tight fit, and while clapping the ends into place, not all the clips lined up with the bottom of the grille and the middle clip was sort of forced into an unmoveable piece of the bumper filler.

After I noticed this, I fiddled with it and DID get the middle clip to clip into the bumper filler, but it's still broke and still obvious (to me anyway). That part of the grille has to snap into the other part, so just putting epoxy on it would still make it a weak point. JK has the right idea; I'll have to find something rigid and sturdy, like a strip of hard plastic or metal, to adhere to the back of that part of the grille to line it back up and reinforce it, then paint over it. It is a clean break, so it shoudl look alright when I mate the seam back together.

Thanks for all the great comments. I'm glad it looks good to other people and not just me hehe. I like it a lot, since I knew these grille stiyes existed for these trucks I wanted to get one on mine, and now I have it and it's nice. I know one thing for sure, I have never seen one of these grilles in person before on these body style trucks. Not anyway. Even online, aside from the few trucks they have in the advertisement photos for these grilles, there aren't very many of these grilles that I have seen.

 

[foreverfalcon40]

510 the cheapest? that's f'in expsensive!

 

[sasquatch094]

take that bug shield off. i think it would show that grille more and make it pop

 

[General Stalin]

510 the cheapest? that's f'in expsensive!

For a phantom billet grille shell kit with billet bowtie and billet inserts pre-installed, yeah it's a pretty solid price, plus the shipping was FREE. Which is amazing, because it ships as an oversize item. Just the inserts alone are a couple hundred bucks.

take that bug shield off. i think it would show that grille more and make it pop

Thanks for the tip, and I definitely know what you mean. It will be weird taking it off because it's been on there since I bought the truck haha. It will look a lot sportier, though.

 

[sasquatch094]

hhah yea give it a shot.. imean its probably only on by a couple screws right? couldnt be that bad to take off then on if u dont like it..

 

[foreverfalcon40]

Ya know...really can't justify spending 500 beans on a grill. Its your G/F good for you...when your done...send her my way ; )

You mentioned you were painting it primer?
Why need a new bumper...yours looked fine...abundant at junkyard too...

Please...please....rid those orange lights...tint em up or get clear ones.

 

[General Stalin]

Yeah, my girlfriend and I have been together for 3 and a half years, I don't think we'll be parting ways anytime soon ;P. She is good to me. As for the grille, well brand new grilles ARE expensive; really no way around it. My bumper didn't "look fine" the flanges were all ruined and bent, and the bumper itself was actually twisted from end to end just a bit. No way it would ever be straight again. Plus, my bumper mounts were all bent and stretched. Don't know if you were aware, but there is a lot of residual, hidden, and sometimes latent damage to a vehicle when you hit something.

On top of that, I care about this truck. I'm not going to throw on some old faded, dinged up bumper with flaky chrome on it. Nothing beats band new parts. I'm not painting the chrome parts of the truck. It's gonna be flat black with chrome trim. I DO need a new trim piece for the bumper, because I just put my old one back on and it looks like crap.

 

[foreverfalcon40]

Yes I do now...how bad **** gets fuked up when you hit something...I have pics but the retard site won't let me load em up.

OOO though you were blackin out the whole thing!

My bad...but do please change those lights...there an eye sore to your new front end!

 

[General Stalin]

Yeah I know I want to black them out. I'll probably do that when I take the grille off to fix it (maybe this weekend if the weather is still nice.)