1982 Mirada Grille

[kkritsilas]

Hi,

I have a question regarding the grille slats on a 1982 Mirada. The slats are 5 horizontal pieces that go horizontally across the opening for the radiator. From all I have seen, they are supposed to be body coloured, with a thin chrome strip. My 1982 has them in black, and when I posted pictures of the car, I was told that they are supposed to be chrome, so I have started to look for the chrome strips.

I just ran into this (picture below) while doing a country kijiji wide search for Dodge Miradas. The body color on this car is the same as mine (nightwatch blue, colour code SC9), and it too has black strips in the grille slats. When I talked to the person selling the car (no interest in the car, just wanted to ask about he grille slats and strips), he said that they were delivered like this, and he is the original owner. Does anybody know if this is correct, were the black strips options, or did they come standard with certain body colours? The car I just found on Kijiji is the top picture, my own car is on the bottom.

Kostas

 

[CMX360]

Did he know you already had one? My guess is that he was lying to you. I've met plenty of bullshitters in my travels. I own the dealer literature for all years of the Mirada and colored grilling is not a listed option. It's not in any of the parts books either. There was a guy selling an "all original survivor" Mirada on eBay not long ago that had a painted back bumper (never an option) and what looked like a full repaint (all the pinstriping was gone). It was a CMX and pinstriping was part of the CMX package. I called him out on it in an email and he never responded of course. The car sold for big money. I hope the poor bastard that bought it knew what he was getting. It may have been a very clean Mirada but it sure as shit was not original or a survivor. If the black won't clean off of yours you will have to hunt for a new nose or leave it black. I think the black looks good. I have a nose with terrible chrome that I'm going to black out for my CMX just to change things up a bit. I'm going to black out the chrome on my tail lights as well. Those strips are hard to come by. Arizona parts only had two NOS ones and I bought them.

 

[kkritsilas]

When I emailed him, I only let him know that I was interested in the car, no more. I did ask him if he was the original owner, and if the grille strips came from the factory like that. because all of the literature showed the chrome only grille strips. He said that he was the first owner, and it came that way. He could have been full of it, of course, but i didn't get the feeling that he was lying. This is what prompted my original question.

There are other things that have come out as being weird on the Miradas. The up and over the roof chrome band for example, is chrome with body colour accents on my car. On another member's white Mirada, it is chrome with black accents, not body color. I have an M04 molding code on my fender tag that nobody has as of yet been able to decode. It is in the molding group, but whether it is the wide chrome molding on the rocker panels, or the body colour accent roof band, nobody has been able to determine. Stuff like that.

When I first put up the pictures of my Mirada, the consensus here was that the grille strips had been painted, alons with the chrome window trim around the rear quarter/opera windows (the fixed ones in the sail panel). Got the paint off of the chrome trim around the quarter windows off with lacquer thinner pretty easily. The strips in the grille didn't clean off well at all, as the black paint is on what appears to be a clear coat. The lacquer thinner takes the black paint off fine, but it also damages the clear coat. So trying to remove the black paint is only going to result in really messed up chrome strips. I have tried to find replacement chrome strips, but haven't been able to, yet. Seems like they are really hard to find.

Kostas

 

[jasperjacko]

Check for something similar at an auto body supply

 

[jbergmopes]

Ma Mopar is somewhat famous for putting cars off the assembly line with unorthidox, some even unbelievable combos. Nothing new. It's been going on since the 70's. I've been experimenting with some small diameter chrome plastic tubing but so far no success

 

[kkritsilas]

Another of my hobbies is guitars, and guitar amps. There is some silver/chrome piping that is used to restore guitar amps. I wonder if that would work. Would have to figure out a way to attach it to the rest of the grille, but the thought occured to me just now. Possibly the stuff they used as door edging might work as well, and some of ti was chrome colored . Diameters are probably off, though. Here is one listing for the guitar amp piping, there are probably tons of other ones:

http://www.tubesandmore.com/products/S-GP005

I suspect that the black slats may have been some variant that may not have been documented. First, my car is in Alberta, and the other car is in Ontario (~2,000 miles away). If my car was painted by one of the former owners, I find it hard to believe that another owner of a car with the exact same colour as mine (SC9, Nightwatch Blue) had the same idea as the peron who owned my car). Second, as per the phone call with the owner of the Ontario car, who purports to be the original owner, this was a factory colour on the slats; he says that he didn't paint it. To be honest, even my slats look pretty factory, even though it would be easily possible for the slats to be be painted as well by somebody who knew how to paint properly.

Kostas

 

[doc]

I had a look at that Mirada on the weekend thinking it would work for a parts car. The chrome had been painted over. As far as I know those were always chrome.

 

[High Speed Pursuit]

In my opinion, the grill chrome was painted after it left the factory. I ordered my Crimson Red 1983 Mirada and I clearly remembering the fascia with "brite grill bar and strip" being the only option because I was more into the mono-chrome look at the time...black was not a choice. If you think about manufacturing processes, the front and rear bumper covers of most 80's cars up to now are built and painted off site and then attached to the car during assembly as a complete unit and as most have seen in some colors they don't always match the car very well...GM had the worst mismatches in my opinion. Those rolls of chrome strip would have been a manufactured as such and cut to spec and attached. All that said, I've see thousands of Mirada's in my day and I've never seen black grill bars...my car is also Nightwatch Blue with brite grill bars. Not trying to promote a product, but this site appears to be the answer to our grill bar needs...I will be painting my car soon and will be ordering the closest extruded form to the factory grill bar form soon from this site...we will need just under 200 inches for the entire Mirada grill. The site's link is http://www.flexchrome.com/products/extruded.htm

 

[kkritsilas]

The Flexchrome site is great. If anybody does have replacement strips/bars, it would probably be them. I have to go out and measure the height of the strips/bars to know which Flexchrome extrusion would fit best. I actually think the chrome would look best, as it would fit better with the rest of the chrome work on the car, and there is more than a little bit of that.

The only other Mirada I have ever seen (aside from my own) in the last twenty years was a black over red one, which is the one that inspired me to get the one I have now. I think it had the chrome strips in it. Truly sad story about the black one. A friend of a friend passed away, and this was his car. My friend asked if I was interested, and I said yes. I put in an offer, probably above what the car was worth (base model with a 318, and a broken transmission); over twice what I paid for my current Mirada. Didn't hear anything for a while, even though I was asking every couple of days about it. Next thing I know, it was already sent to the crushers. I ended up paying less for my Mirada, and it has more options, but the black one had less rust on the body, but would have needed a replacement transmission or a transmission rebluild. I'm pretty sure that I like the Nightwatch Blue color better than the Black.

Kostas

 

[jasperjacko]

how about bending some polished stainless tubing and glue it in with windsheild adhesive?

 

[MiradaMegacab]

I was walking by a 1996 Infinity and it looks like the chrome strips from the front and rear bumpers would be a good candidate to look into for the Miradas grille.

 

[Buck Atwater]

Sorry to revive such an old thread, but has anyone tried the flex chrome stuff or found any other good alternative for the chrome grille bars? I'm putting my car back together after getting it painted, and my old ones are shot. I'm also looking for something that could work for the front bumper rub strip.

Any ideas?

 

[FredMcJoe]

Sorry to revive such an old thread, but has anyone tried the flex chrome stuff or found any other good alternative for the chrome grille bars? I'm putting my car back together after getting it painted, and my old ones are shot. I'm also looking for something that could work for the front bumper rub strip.

Any ideas?

I've had samples of the stretchable vinyl in chrome, you'd probably find it suitable. Check out the new vinyl woodgrain on my wagon. Similar stuff, easy to work with if you're artsy.

 

[aspen77rt]

--- Post updated ---
Oops wrong thread

 

[Miradaman]

I went to Advance Auto parts and bought the chrome door edge trim and used a heat gun to bend it to fit. On the bumper rub strip, I bought matte black vinyl door banger trim, and Permatexed it into place.