While I like the bumper guards up through '72, the '73 and up are bugly. So, T.L., I half agree with you.
What, mullets and Van Halen are out of style?! But I to ripped the boat ankers off the front of the car, now what to do about the holes in the bumper?
Bumper bolts. If you can't find any, you can also steal the ones from behind the front license plate, since the holes will not be visible with the plate on there anyway...
While I'm not a great fan of bumper guards myself, they do have thier good points. I was involved in two seperate incidents were the bumper guards ( and those big gawdy bumpers) protected my Mavericks from big time damage. When I hit that deer last spring with my 77' Maverick, it was the bumper guard that took almost all of the impact. Without the guard, the deer would have gone right into my grill. Damage to the car was minimal. The damage to the deer was fatal. A few years back when we still had our Stallion, it was hit from behind by another driver who failed to notice that my husband had stopped for oncoming traffic. The front of the other drivers SUV connected with the right rear bumper guard on the Stallion. The impact was hard enough to push the Stallion out into the intersection. The damage to the Stallion was a bent impact strip on the bumper guard. Damage to the SUV was a pushed in bumper. Without the bumper guard the Stallion could have had the tail light panel and possibly the trunk lid damaged. So you see, they do serve a good purpose. I may not care for the way they look, but I'm sure glad the cars had them.
This is a very valid point. One must make a choice between appearance and extra protection. I get off kind'a easy, because my '73 has a medium-size front bumper, so it can take a lot of impact ( I have tested this therory myself) and yet retains a decent appearance. Kind of a compromise between the good looks of the '70-'72 bumper, and the bulkyness of the '74-'77 bumpers...
Jean makes a valid point for big bumper cars, because there is enough strength in the big bumpers to allow the damage to be confined to just a messed up bumper gaurd in minor collisions. Bumper gaurds on a small bumper car serve no functional purpose, because they are bolted to the bumper itself. I would venture to say small bumpers on early Mavericks are probably weaker then the actual bumper gaurd itself... They are strictly for looks on a small bumper car IMO, and the looks ain't good...
The big bumpers were the first generation of the Federal impact bumper standards...remember some of the Granada's even had a big rubber chunk looking b-guard..
I have not seen them anywhere. Check with www.autokrafters.com and do a Google for Green Sales Company. You will need a part number to search for it with them. Seth
I like the idea of my car looking like a little old lady's car, It'll be nice to not have the local law following me everytime I drive into town, like they do the mustang. I've been thinking of using black urethane caulk to make new guard pads. ( too much otherstuff to do before I get to that, but If I can find a good one, I could make a mold. might not look great, but better than rusty backing and flopping rubber.)
