PINTO CAR CLUB of AMERICA
Welcome to FordPinto.com, The home of the PCCA => General Help- Ask the Experts... => Topic started by: russosborne on August 16, 2018, 02:40:33 AM
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Was it 77 and 78, or just one of those?
Definitely not 79, correct?
And how much weight savings are we talking about?
My brain is feeling kaput lately. Too much overtime. But it looks really good on the paycheck. And will help finance the Pinto soon. I hope.
Thanks,
Russ
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Well, since no one else has responded, I’ll say that my all stock 1980 Pony SE has aluminum bumpers.
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Russ,
I've been researching that very topic lately. I can't say 100% surely, but it looks like the first aluminum bumpers appeared on the 77-78 Pintos. I'm still not sure if they are a direct replacement for the steel ones on the 74-76 cars, but I'm checking that out now.
Finding NOS ones will be the trick, however.
Paul (a.k.a. cossiepinto)
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Russ
I am sure the answer is 77-78. My 76 was completely different.
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Thanks.
That was what I thought I have read here.
The 79 might be aluminum, but they aren't the same style. Stupid things are cut at the ends instead of wrapping around. Have a rubberish piece on the ends instead. Yuck.
Russ
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79's were aluminum.
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I'd like to know what the actual weight difference is between the '76 steel and the '77 aluminum. I think the '77-'78 bumpers still had the steel back up piece, and the aluminum was just the shiny face. In that case, the weight advantage of the aluminum bumper might be minimized. If the weight savings were significant, I'd be hunting for the aluminum pieces. I did do a short search for them and found nothing in NOS condition on ebay or anywhere on the 'net for that matter.
When I was dismantling the car that has become the Cosworth Pinto, I removed the front and rear bumpers and replaced them with custom parts a friend made for me in his shop. The weight savings was phenomenal!
Funny story: I was looking around town for the Pinto for my Cosworth Pinto project, and I had spotted a car in a modest part of town that fit the bill. It was powder blue, a '74-'76, and in great, still-driven condition. I wanted to stop by and make an offer for the car, but had not yet done so when I found the car I eventually used ('74 trunk model, 2.0 engine, 4speed). I went about taking my car apart, removing those heavy bumpers, etc. Then I remembered the little blue car had a damaged rear bumper. It looked like it had caught on a post or something on the driver's side, and it was peeled back a bit. I had the bumpers in my truck to take to the wrecking yard, and thought I'd go by and offer to replace that damaged bumper with mine, which was in good shape. I didn't know the owner, but what the heck, I just loaded up the tools I would need and stopped by. The owner was a little older lady. When she came to the door, I told her that I'd like to replace her bumper for free. She said ok, so I set to work. Of course, the fasteners were rusted tight. I had brought some penetrating oil and a breaker bar, luckily. I crawled around under her car for about an hour, got filthy, finished the job, loaded her damaged bumper in my truck, and let her know I was done. I guess she had called her daughter(?) to tell her there was this crazy man in her driveway monkeying with her car, because a bit after I'd started, this woman showed up and went inside. I noticed they were peeking through a window watching me! Who is that guy? Why? Anyway, I told them goodbye and was on my way. I still checked out the car occasionally, but never approached her to offer to buy it, since I now had my own. About a year later, the car disappeared. Now I wish I'd have tried to buy it anyway.
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the 77 to 78 bumpers will fit 74 to 76 , you will save over 100 lbs , 79 and 80 ar also alum but are all by them selfs , I have one time using a band saw cut the bottem half off the 77/78 alum bumpers to make a 71/73 bumper replacment (because I could not find any at the time ) and polished it up and looked just like the narrow bumpers , light and rust proof , a few months ago I brought a rusted 78 just to have some spares parts and spare bumpers , get them if you see them , being alumimum they can be fixed if not bent too much , cracks can be welded and buffed out to a shine without going to a shop to get recromed , but you can if you have the bucks to do so
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"I have one time using a band saw cut the bottom half off the 77/78 alum bumpers to make a 71/73 bumper replacement (because I could not find any at the time ) and polished it up and looked just like the narrow bumpers ..."
[/size]I have always wondered about doing that. Thanks for posting that it can be done. With the costs of chrome today polished aluminum bumpers may be the future for many cars.
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Oh, joy. Once again I simply 'cut and paste' directly from the original post and get the ^above^ and with this miniaturized font. WHY??? It looks perfectly fine when I construct it.
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... I have one time using a band saw cut the bottom half off the 77/78 alum bumpers to make a 71/73 bumper replacement (because I could not find any at the time ) and polished it up and looked just like the narrow bumpers...
Thank you I have always wondered about doing this. With the cost of chrome polished aluminum bumpers may be the future replacement for many cars.
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I would like to save a hundred pounds, for sure. If all goes as planned, I'll be needing a set of aluminum bumpers (77-78) if they bolt on with no additional fab work. I will have a set of NOS steel bumpers (still in the wrappers) to sell or trade for some unblemished alu ones.