My factory plastic grille piece is broken and im looking to replace it. When I do that I also want to get the billet grille for it. I guess what I'm asking is what oem grille should I get? The one with the 6 sections or the one with the honeycomb? I have a 2003 "thunderbolt". The reason I put it in "" is because ive never seen a regular cab flare side thunderbolt. Im starting to think the guy I bought it from in Texas converted to a thunderbolt possibly? Any info will be greatly appreciated and Im a brand new member and this is my first post so dont shun me if theres anything wrong with the posting haha. Thanks.

 

Do you have any pictures of the front end you could post up so we can see it?

 

Going to take some now...be back in a sec with em

 

here ya go... now you can see the grille i have now and i have a picture of the honeycomb replacement but if im putting in a billet grille it will cover that up anyways so i guess it doesnt matter. and yes my truck is dirty from all the pollen and its been sitting up for about 6 months because i have a company vehicle and have no use for it but im trying to get back into driving it and finally fixing it.

 

What you have there is a 2wd front end. Nothing special about it, except it looks like the last owner stuck on an e-bay special hood scoop. To get the honeycomb grille, you need to find one off an 2001-2003 4wd, but I think to make it not have a gap you might need the powerdome hood from the same year ranger. You could just get the grille tho, not sure how bad the gap would actually be, if any.

 

yeah the last owner rear-ended someone. And yeah the hood scoop is stick on. The sun has cracked it all four corners. I wish I could take it off but between the glue under it and sunfade I don;t think its worth doing. I've got the valence in the shed. It's actually in good shape except for the fact that where it bolts to the bumper all the rivets are broken haha. So im thinking im just going to replace the whole front end. But I know what your talking about with the gap and that hood. So I guess im just going to replace it with the same one and the billet grille just inserts right into that correct?

 

I swapped to honeycomb on my '99 and I don't believe there is a gap with the stock hood but I also have a bug reflector.

 

thanks alot man...i guess what i was really wondering is which one looks best with the billet insert or do they all look the same with it?

 

Do you have to use the honey comb as the background for the billet or do the sell billet setups that go over your style stock grill?

If you have to replace the grill either way, might as well go honeycomb. Got mine off ebay for like $50 if I remember right. It was brand new but not Ford product. Still was nice thought and fits perfect. Came with new clips for the bottom also.

 

see thats what I'm not sure about so I guess I'll just replace with honeycomb and save the struggle. And yeah I found one on there just a min ago for cheaper than that I think.