Articles » Upper Grill Mesh Modification

well, matt2507 pm asking about how to mesh he upper grill.....and i was gonna redo mine today to take off the red h emblem i had on there.....and i said i would take pics so here is somewhat of a how to with pics......(this is with the grill already removed from the car and bumper)

this is pretty much all that is needed, might want some sandpaper and metal snips close by as well......(your grill, phillips head screwdriver,jigsaw,dremmel, and i used gutter mesh from home depot)


first thing you'll wanna do is remove the 9 screws holding on the painted trim piece on front....the screws are circled in red in the pic.....(note-this is for 96-98 grill, 99-00 may be different, but i imagine it's pretty close)


after that, the painted trim should come right off and you should end up with this....(note, like i said earlier i already had mesh installed, so you would just have the black plastic and chrome h)


next, you're gonna cut out the grill work....i chose only to cut out the cross pieces (where the red circles are) and not the entire piece in the middle (at dotted line), thats your choice....i just used a jigsaw and cut through it then sanded the rough spots.....


this was my finished product...


now starts the harder part, the actual mesh.....lay the mesh on the grill and draw an outline of the shape, it's best to trace it a little bigger and trim later, as you cant add material if it's too small.....and you'll want there to be room to adjust if needed.....


and this is the mesh after it's cut, i used a dremmel to cut the basic shape and metal snips to clean it up....but if you dont have a dremmel, you can do it all by snips......will just take a little longer.....


lay the mesh on the grill and test fit it, you'll notice that there are slots and tabs that hold the painted piece to the black plastic, you will need to cut out the mesh in these areas so that the tabs can still fit in the slots....also check that there is no mesh on top of the screw holes....this is the most important part.....so that when it goes back together, it doesnt look distorted.....


trim as needed, between trims, test fit with the painted piece so that you dont trim too much and so you make sure the mesh covers the entire opening.....


once that is done, it's just a matter of assembling everything back together......and if done right, it should look like this....


pretty much what it looks like during test fit, but screwed down.....then youre ready to reinstall on your civic.....the mesh is held in place by being sandwiched between the painted trim and black plastic, i didnt see any need to secure it any other way.....

well, i hope this helps some people that wanna do their own grills.....total price was $3.XX and a little time....