1968 reproduction rear bumper- Junk

[shelbymann1970]

As of 2012, those driver side inner handles we're still clocked wrong. Luckily I finally found an NOS one.

on the DS because you are always pulling up I took my holes and elongated them with a carbide burr in the circular pattern so I could rotate my handle . Kept doing it until it was almost parallel to the ground. It was as far as I could go. looks better than it nothing was done. Pretty close to pass side factory handle.  Gary 

[shelbymann1970]

the rear bumper on my car needs a re chrome BUT has a college parking sticker from 1968-69 still on it and in good shape i got the car from the original owner. So I thought id get a reproduction till I decide what to do. Keep the old with the sticker on it, re chrome and do without the sticker, try to remove the sticker.

Anyway after some on line research i went with the CJ's rear bumper. Other than it being 1/8 inch too wide and the braces having a 1/4 gap due to the angle, the square bolt holes being misaligned and the replacement bolts 1/8 inch larger head diameter, they were perfect!

Anything out there of excellent quality that you guys have installed? thanks

My 68 Shelby came with repo bumpers "new in the wrappers". I don't recall the rear having fit problems. Here is a pic of the rear.  they would have been purchased by PO in the 90s. They were NORDAN bumpers. https://www.vintage-mustang.com/threads/nordan-bumpers.330775/    Gary

[Coralsnake]

Getting off topic but those long window cranks are not correct for a deluxe interior.

😉

[hurlbird]

ill send mine out for rechrome and try to save the sticker. I have a Pontiac with repro rear bumper I bought 16 years ago. Fit great and still look great. Hoped for the same experience here. Oh well!

[JohnHouston]

There is no good answer here.  My last two experiences with two different platers left me having to write ugly letters to get back the parts they lost.  The shop that lost my very, very rare Italian stuff closed about a week after we had it out.

John

[Coralsnake]

Multiple by a thousand and you can start to feel what these people restoring cars are dealing with

[rsmith]

I just got a rear bumper from Branda and had the same fitment issues. used shims between the bracket and bumper to help. Now the issue is the ends are about an inch below the end caps. I can't raise it by shimming because it is almost up against the taillight panel. Probably all these repros come from the same manufacturer. Mine has a Taiwan sticker on it. I would have re-chromed the original bumper but is has a dent in it.

[Coralsnake]

Just curious are you expecting the bumper to be higher?

Its designed to have that gap.

[camp upshur]

Is Nordan still around?

[67 GT350]

Worst fitting bumper I have ever seen, 69 70 Mustang rear bumpers. Not sure on the 69 70 Shelbys.

[shelbymann1970]

Worst fitting bumper I have ever seen, 69 70 Mustang rear bumpers. Not sure on the 69 70 Shelbys.

Again depends on the manufacturer and when made. This is a Nordan put on my car back around 1990. I assume Nordan because the front bumper had a NORDAN sticker on it when I replaced it. This one fits good. Original rechromed bumper on the Shelby. Repo on the Mach1. last pic an all original car never taken apart stored since the early 70s(blown engine)

[98SVT - was 06GT]

I guess I am not shocked a cheap, off shore bumper does not fit.

It fits the knock off body shell perfect. They are probably stamping the bumper and them punching the holes. The original tooling would have produced the whole part with one crunch of the dies.

[Bob Gaines]

Worst fitting bumper I have ever seen, 69 70 Mustang rear bumpers. Not sure on the 69 70 Shelbys.

69/70 Mustang and Shelby rear bumpers are the same.

[shelbymann1970]

I guess I am not shocked a cheap, off shore bumper does not fit.

It fits the knock off body shell perfect. They are probably stamping the bumper and them punching the holes. The original tooling would have produced the whole part with one crunch of the dies.

I work in sheet metal stampings and have since 1978. You would have a multiple of dies to get your end result for a bumper or any other body part. Usually no less than 4. The problem lies when off shore companies eliminate the die stamping processes and do some things by hand or not at all because dies are NOT cheap or they don't spend the time($$$) making sure their end product is "dead nuts on". Here in the USA our ave die cost per die is 250-300K and we have been working on getting that down but will never compete with China for a number of reasons and one major one is material cost on the onset. Our raw materials cost us more that it costs China to make a die including their material cost the last time I went through the cost meetings.
  One good example were the stamping of "full" 69-70 Mustang fastback quarters for a long time before dynacorn came out with a real full quarter. To get a factory stamping the 3rd or 4th operation would flange(tuck) in the lower rear quarter for the drain design. Repos never had that. You got the draw die shape which cannot "tuck" so the  trunk drop off never fit and the flange sits way too low and sticks out like a sore thumb. 
  On new dies we do "first panel scans" and score out panels. What is off due to spring back or bolster flex is digitized and sent back to die design/engineering to correct. We are finally with new technology being able to predict better spring back and bolster flex to the tune our first panel score are much higher. 90 plus is what it takes for a buyoff panel.  We have hit a few panels in the 90s the first time in the last year. Drives down iterations and cost and ups advanced die delivery time(BIG deal) to assy plants. That is what we need to do to survive as a UAW Die shop inside of GM. Because of this we are bringing more work back inhouse this year and hiring a lot of Die makers.
Usually you have a draw die, first trim die(direct). second trim/flange, cam trim cam flange and pierce. Sometimes you need 5 dies to perform all the tasks. Piercing holes are usually done in the last die after the panel is "set" after flanging. Variables to this process is why we have die designers and die engineers which we work with in our facility.  I'd post pics of all the operations(planning showing all dies and what they do) but don't want to get fired. This process can easily be found online I'd think. Gary

[67 GT350]

Worst fitting bumper I have ever seen, 69 70 Mustang rear bumpers. Not sure on the 69 70 Shelbys.

69/70 Mustang and Shelby rear bumpers are the same.

Yes they are, but not sure of the fit around the endcap. Just thinking one or the other, (Mustang or Shelby) might fit different.