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Looks like the grille is starting to come together nicely. Did the mesh make the fitment a bit tight on the bottom? I had that issue with mine as the mesh was rather thick. It all worked out and the mesh looks great, but it did require a bit of creativity on my end to get everything to fit together properly.
^haven't test-fitted to the car yet. Any chance you have a photo of the backside of the grille handy?
I think as long as a neatly trim the mesh along the inner edge of the grille opening, I should avoid clearance issues. As you can tell, I still have a bit of trimming to do...
No sorry. I just went through my build thread to see if I had any, but no. I remember the cutting, sanding, etc. of the mesh was the most time consuming part of the project. There is no easy way to do it you just have to keep test fitting it.
^gotcha, well if all goes according to plan, vinyl wrap will be done by Tues, and I'll install the final grille Wednesday AM.
Any tips on vinyl wrapping the grille frame? Seems fairly straight fwd, but my vinyl experience is limited (have only done the window trim...which was a learning experience).
I have not tempted fate with my lack of vinyl wrapping skills yet. So I am afraid I cannot offer you any good advice except that I assume it will require a good deal of patience. (Man I am useless on this thread today )
Glad to hear the test fit went well. That definitely took some experimentation with my grille. Probably due to the fact that the mesh I got was extremely thick. However, this probably means that I could probably run over a bear and the entire front end of my car would be demolished, but the mesh grille would still be intact.
Test-fit with ABS mesh...all went well and no adjustments needed! Final (and probably toughest) step, the vinyl wrap, is upcoming. Stay tuned...
Looks great! Seems simle enough, you should do a write-up! I'd love to do a mesh conversion... The OEM lines just don't do it for me. Looks like a beluga whale face.
^haha, think I know what you mean. And planning on doing a write-up soon (complete with video from the shop that did most of the custom work).
Annnnd here's the final outcome. Again, this IS NOT the "CMOD" mesh grille, so I'll go ahead and make a new thread for this custom/OEM grille, to share further details and photos.
Thanks to folks in this thread that provided feedback and tips, really helped me with this project!
^thanks for the feedback, and agreed (we’ve discussed before)
Just so happens, the 2019 QX50 grille emblem has a nice black base and flat profile, so that will be swapped in eventually (And I’ll move current grille emblem to the rear deck lid, since I’ve removed the “INFINITI” badging)
I dropped my added comments while your were responding. After a few minutes, I didn't see the point, and just wanted to congratulate you on this project.
That looks really nice and seems to match the paint pretty well. Does it seem to be a good color match in person? I take it the vinyl wrapping went pretty smoothly?
The vinyl (3M 1080 gloss black) is a good color-match for Black Obsidian (Nissan KH3), but its finish has a good amount of orange peel relative to the paint. So within a foot or two and in direct sunlight, the finishes are different. Will get a proper paintjob at some point...