A New Rear:

I had already performed some mods to the rear of the car back in '86 including switching the taillights to all red, removing the Ford badging and installing a Cobra II rear spoiler. When I started "Project G.T. 140" I removed the rear bumper the same time I pulled the front. As the Mustang II was rumored to suffer the same "explosive" results as the Pintos in rear collisions, I shortened the mounts and installed a new steel bumper made of 1/4" channel iron. This was covered with a valence I made with fiberglass that when installed would result in a smooth flat rear.

The photo at right shows the valence loosely hanging on the car (it does fit completely flush around the edges).

Following the advice of my greatest supporter (my daughter), I've decided to re-style the complete back of the car to resemble the Daytona Coupe. So the old valence was turfed and a new one begun.

 

 

 

 

The "Kammback" shaped rear of the originals is certainly a unique shape (for more on the design see the Real Daytona Coupes page). This photo of one of the "McCluskey" replicas served as a guide for construction of my own. The Mustang II doesn't quite have the same shaped flanks so I took a lot of "artistic license" with mine (besides I'm not building a replica).

 

The taillights used were Lucas Model L488s, fortunately these were used on a lot of different cars so I shouldn't have too much trouble locating some at a reasonable (cheap) price.

Photographed and copyrighted by Stan Gidaszewski. Used with permission.

 

Installing the new rear over the original tail light panel would have added far to much length to the car so the first thing I did was take out the jigsaw and cut off about 2" - 3" from the rear. The only piece remaining of the factory panel was the lip that the hatch seals to. The sides of the fenders were carefully folded into a new lip for mounting a whole new panel.

I then attached a piece of 3/16" board with a single screw to the center of the hatch floor then added scraps of wood as spacers to flex the panel into the concave shape.

 

In this photo you can see the scraps in place, I also threw on the original Cobra spoiler on to see how it would look (Sorry people but it's not for sale, I'm saving it for my Daughter's '77)

 

 

The panel-board was cut to shape to see how close I could get to the "correct" shape.

 

In this photo I threw the old spoiler on top and with a can of Ford blue, sprayed the shape of the spoiler I was striving for. (I was also curious as to how a number would look on the car...verdict's still out)

 

 

 

 

 

Once I was satisfied with the amount of curve, I coated the mounting surfaces of the car with paste wax (release agent) and laid several layers of mat.

This layer forms the inside of the rear panel and is not visible once completed so I wasn't too concerned about keeping it smooth.

 

Next step was filling in the area with polyurethane foam. I used about three cans of the stuff before I realized I had purchased the "low expansion" brand. As Homer would say: "Doh!" Since then I've only used the triple expanding type

 

In this photo you can see the piece of cardboard backer to keep the spoiler from sagging before the foam set.

 

Once an excess of foam was in place, I let it cure for several days (it's real messy cutting into this stuff if it isn't fully set). Once I was satisfied it was dry; I cut and sanded it to shape. Then I had another Homer moment. All of this work had been done with the car on jack stands as I don't the rear suspension installed. The jacks were set higher than the car would ride and I realized the spoiler just wasn't tall enough once it was at ride height. By this time I had already applied my first layer of glass over it. An additional 1 1/2" had to be added.

As the factory hatch curves downward quite steeply, foam was also sprayed over this area and several layers of glass laid over to keep it all at the same slope. Once this had all dried, I used a jigsaw to re-open the seam and then the exposed edges smoothed and sealed to create a "mini spoiler" on the hatch.

 

In this photo you can see the "mini spoiler" on the hatch. At this point I haven't lowered the car and realized the spoiler wasn't tall enough!

 

 

Here I've lowered the car and added the extra height to the spoiler. Also the first layer of mat has been applied over the panel-board. The rectangular opening at the center of the spoiler will be plumbed to release air trapped in the rear fenders and in front of the rear panel. This vent was an innovative idea Pete Brock used on the originals to further improve downforce at high speeds.

Soon after this photo was taken, the rear panel was "popped" off the car and additional fiberglass applied over the panel board. The next step will be to complete the vent, do the final smoothing, drill the tail light holes and then re-attach the part permanently.

 

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