Factory Grabber paint question.....

Did the factory paint the sport mirrors and spoilers before they were installed on the car, or after? I bought a Grabber trunk lid and where the spoiler goes is real rusty, surface rust. Looks like it wasn't painted from the factory. On the sport mirrors, I want to install them, but don't want to get paint on the gaskets when I paint the car. I'm thinking spray the mirrors and spoiler off the car, then install . What do ya'll think?

 

I would paint the components off the car.Its much easier to paint mirrors and irregular shaped components off the car.At least I allways paint that stuff seperate but:at the same time..

 

We shot mine off the car. I liked that way better.

 

I know the sport mirrors were painted separate from the car.
This is why cars that had special order colors got black sport mirrors.

I would assume the spoilers were painted separately too, as the trunk lid under the spoiler is painted body color.

 

When I removed the spoiler from my Grabber trunk lid it was painted body color.

 

My 73 was primer under the spoiler.

 

paint the car, then paint the 'accessory' components off of the car....

 

Mirror were off the car when the factory painted them, the mirror gaskets are black plastic, the screws arent painted ,and the door is body color benieth the mirror.

 

my trunklid is primer under the spoiler...

 

That's what my new trunk lid looks like, except it's surface rust, instead of primer. I wonder if like some other things, it was a plant by plant decision?
That would account for it surface rusting , being primer instead of paint....

 

Really?

I have never seen black sport mirrors on an original car.

Seth

 

Looking at this green Grabber, it looks like when the car was in the body shop in the factory, a Grabber deck lid would need a template placed to punch the holes for the spoiler. Then the deck lid and the rest of the body would be preped for e-coat and primer. After primer, the spoiler could have been installed and painted the finished color with the rest of the car. Sport mirrors were painted on a fixture with the car and installed in trim. I do not know if the spoilers were plastic or metal. If they were plastic then they would not make it through the bake ovens. They could have been a vender part delivered to the plant and installed as a completed part in trim. Different assembly plants did things differently.

 

The spoilers are fiberglass

 

I don't know why I am surprised that some Grabbers are paint and some are primer.
Just like I shouldn't have been surprised that black engine bays are more common than they are supposed to be.

Seth,
The mirrors were painted standard colors at the point of manufacture. Then they were sent to assembly plants to be married up with cars of the same color.
When a color was special ordered that was not standard, they could not anticipate that at the plant where the mirrors were made and painted, so some semi-gloss black mirrors were sent out for use on non-standard paint cars.

Now, I must say that I don't know how many Mavericks or Comets were special ordered with a non-standard color, or if any were at all...
What I can say is that this rule applied to ALL FoMoCo products equipped with sport mirrors and numerous examples of Mustangs and Cougars can be found in special order paint with black sport mirrors. If a Maverick or Comet was ever special order painted, it DID get black mirrors. There are also cases of standard color cars getting black sport mirrors because they ran out of the mirrors in the standard color needed for that car. Again, I have knowledge of this in other Fords, and one would think some Mavericks were so equipped due to shortages, but of course Mavericks weren't nearly as documented as much so far, as some other models.

 

No.
The sport mirrors were made in one plant, where they were painted standard colors available for that model car, then shipped to assembly plants.
This is well documented by Mustang 'historian' types who have studied all this years ago. It applies to all sport mirrors, not just Stang mirrors. It just so happens that the Stang enthusiasts have done the research for us.


Edit:
I forgot one variable, and the thing that started the whole search for answers among the Stang guys... Some sport mirror cars got low line chrome mirrors from the factory. This caused some folks to think their cars weren't original, since they were supposed to have the sport mirrors. What they found is that sport mirror cars that were orded with a special color didn't get the sport mirrors, for above mentioned reason. Half of those would get chrome base model mirrors instead, and the other half would get semi-flat/semi-gloss sports instead. A Mach 1 is funny looking with a single cheap chrome mirror. That is what caused the research.

Edit again...
Some links:
Go to this thread, then post #8, read about special order paint vs sport mirrors.
http://www.fordmuscle.com/forums/torino-pages/465252-1973-gran-torino-sport-question.html



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