Modding a Mustang GT for an Aggressive Look

(Narrator)>> Today on Detroit Muscle we upgrade the exterior of our EBC Mustang adding a body kit and wrap to give it a more aggressive appearance. Plus Tommy and Marc are super excited to bring back an old project to complete the finishing touches.

(Tommy)>> Hey y'all, welcome to Detroit Muscle. We've got a couple of sweet rides sitting in the shop today. Our '81 Cobra "Project Sydewinder" and a 2016 Mustang GT that we've partnered with EBC Brakes to giveaway a little later down the road. Now from back there where you guys are sitting the curb appeal of these two cars are sitting pretty far apart, but they do have one common thread and that is that they're both a Mustang. And love them or hate them you can't deny that the Mustang has made quite the impact in the automotive world.

(Marc)>> Yeah not only that but they've become engrained in our society. You may be a middle age guy and you like to hear the growl of the V-eight has you hammer the gears down a curvy country road, or even a teenage girl and you want to have the top down and the wind blowing through your hair. Either way the appeal of the Ford Mustang knows no bounds. If you ask me there's one for everybody.

(Tommy)>> Making its debut at the World's Fair in April 1964, the Ford Mustang was the brain child of Lee Iacocca. The recipe was simple. A front engine rear wheel drive two door four seater that was lightweight and affordable. Available with several engine options in a coupe, convertible, and fastback. It was an instant success.

(Marc)>> Fast forward to today and after several generations and 55 years of non-stop production the recipe is the same, and the Mustang is still one of the most popular cars on the road. The aftermarket, well it's alive and well, and our "Project Sydewinder" is a great example of that, but we've taken this car to the extreme. Maybe that's not your taste. Maybe you want something a little more refined but still have that taste for performance. Maybe for you this 2016 Mustang GT is the perfect canvas. Our plan for this car is to build a high horsepower aggressive looking chariot that knows how to go, knows how to whoa, and looks good doing it. We've already installed an Edelbrock supercharger that'll bring this thing to 750 horsepower as well as an aggressive exhaust.

(Tommy)>> So to tweak the image of our already good looking Mustang into a far more aggressive ride we went to Classic Design Concepts for their outlaw kit. It includes a new chin spoiler and grill, rocker panels, roof spoiler, and a trunk spoiler. Now to install this stuff it's pretty much straight forward and doesn't take a whole lot of time to do it. So the first thing we're gonna install is this trunk spoiler. After removing the nuts underneath we'll carefully cut through the factory double sided tape and the old spoiler pops right off.

(Marc)>> Ready for this?

(Tommy)>> I am now.

(Marc)>> Let me get mine in. How tight you want to go?

(Tommy)>> Not too tight. We've still got to peel that red strip off.

(Marc)>> Alright.

(Tommy)>> And with that red strip out of the way we can reinstall the hardware and push in the body plug.

That wasn't very hard at all.

(Marc)>> No it looks good.

(Tommy)>> And on to the roof spoiler. This is way too easy.

(Marc)>> I know.

The front fascia needs to be removed and put on a body stand for this next part.

The impact strip needs to come out, followed by the grille assembly.

That new CDC grille snaps into the factory spot and the impact strip can go back in. We need to drill a couple of holes so that we can route our wiring harness for the new grille l-e-d's.

(Tommy)>> The new lower fascia will install using double sided tape, and with it in place we'll pull those red strips and press it down.

(Marc)>> Well that front fascia's ready to go on the car but we can't put it on just yet because that new grille has those l-e-d's and there's no provisions for that cause the factory one didn't have those. Well they sent them with the kit and most of this is just plug and play except this one wire right here that needs to be spliced into the headlight harness. So we're gonna do that first. We just need to cut into the factory headlamp harness, snip the designated wire, and splice in a butt connector with our red power wire.

Then we can heat shrink and tape up the harness.

The rest is plug and play. The final step is to zip tie the excess wiring up and out of the way. Then the fascia can go back on for a final time, and now it's time for the rockers.

Here you go buddy. I'm gonna go get the other one off.

(Tommy)>> Sure, now we're gonna have to do a little bit of trimming on this one to install our new piece. Isn't no big deal. So let's go ahead and get started. We need to make some marks at two and half inches from one end, two and a half inches from the inside edge, and 11 inches from the other end. The reason we're doing this is to mark where to trim this piece out because we have to use it to install our new rocker. We're gonna use our body saw to make nice, clean cuts, and then we'll get it installed. We'll hold it in place with some spring clamps. Then we can start drilling holes and install the rivets.

This thing just snaps into the factory location, and man does it look nice.

(Narrator)>> Stay tuned as we wrap up our EBC Mustang exterior.

(Tommy)>> Hey y'all welcome back to the shop. We're making some pretty good progress doctoring on the appearance of our EBC Mustang. We've got our body kit installed and it didn't take much effort at all.

(Marc)>> That's right but the next thing we're gonna do is take this thing to the next level and make it one of a kind.

(Tommy)>> We're gonna use a partial wrap on our EBC Mustang to give it the desired look. So I want to introduce you guys to Ian. He's with The Wrap Lab. These guys have knocked it out of the park several times on some of our projects. So to do something like this what's the first thing we need to do?

(Ian)>> First thing you want to do is clean the car. You want to use a microfiber cloth and just isopropyl alcohol.

(Tommy)>> So why would you want to do something like that?

(Ian)>> Well we don't want any dust, we don't want any dirt underneath this surface. If we get that it won't look like paint. You'll be able to tell. The number one most important thing is always preparation. So you really want to clean the car, check the paint, check for dents, check for dings, rock chips. Get everything prepped, clean, no greases, no ceramic coatings. Just really clean and prep everything, and then once you've done that you're gonna be good to go.

(Marc)>> Now you've seen us wrap several cars on the show and you may be wondering why or when a wrap is a better option than paint.

(Ian)>> There's certain applications where a wrap really comes into play. For instance you've only got a couple of days. You need to get something down. It's got to look perfect the first time and you can't have any mistakes. Well our printer is gonna print exactly what our designers put on those computers. We're gonna print that out. We're gonna laminate it, and we're gonna go right down to surface, and it's gonna be perfect every single time.

(Tommy)>> When applying a vinyl wrap to a car you want to make sure you're using the right techniques.

(Ian)>> Sometimes you're gonna need some heat. Other times you're just gonna cold apply and be very patient and consistent. A lot of the issues that people run into is they always stretching, pulling it. You really should be able to read the material as you slowly move through. As you apply it be looking through and see, which way is the material moving. How is it moving? Is it gonna bunch somewhere? Is it gonna create a pocket? If so you need to take a step back and really start to reevaluate how you're gonna apply this or else you will get caught in a tricky situation.

(Tommy)>> All he has left to finish up is to lay out a few decals. Wow, our EBC Mustang looks awesome and is one step closer to being in the driveway of one of our lucky viewers.

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(Tommy)>> Hey y'all we've received a few requests from you guys out there looking for some tips on how to clean up some glass. This is an old piece that we had laying around and it's got window tint on it that's been on there several years and possibly multiple decades. Whenever you go to remove that foil often times what happens is the adhesive stays on the glass. I've seen people use solvent and paper towels and that kind of thing but it's pretty messy. I've got a tip for you that I want to show you that's relatively simple but super effective. The stuff you're gonna need is a few razor blades, some glass cleaner, and some paper towels for cleanup. Whenever doing a task like this I like to start with a new razor blade, not an old one because if it has a burr on it and whenever you go to rubbing on that glass well you're liable to scratch it. Remember when using these things pay attention. They're super sharp. You don't want to hurt yourself. First thing we've got to do is pull off that film.

What I like to do is get a big piece peeled back so that I can snatch it off there quickly. That causes the adhesive mostly to stay on the foil. If you pull it slow often times that adhesive stays on the glass. If I pull it real slow you'll see that that adhesive kinda stays on there, and if I pull it quickly.

Now with these smaller pieces you just kinda gotta keep working at them. It's hard to pull them off. [ plastic ripping ]

With the tint out of the way now we need to remove all that left over adhesive. Plan of attack is use plenty of glass cleaner. What that does is that lubricates the glass plus lubricates your blade and makes it so that the glue won't stick to it, and just bulldoze that stuff off from one side to the other. It's that easy.

You want to keep equal pressure on your blade. Not too heavy on one corner or the other. That'll reduce the chances of scratching your glass.

See that adhesive doesn't even stick to your blade. Alright let's wipe it off and see where we're at.

Heck we didn't even break a sweat doing it this way. Also depending on the age of your tint can dictate how well that stuff pulls, and I hope this little tip I showed you guys helped a few of you out.

(Narrator)>> Coming up Tommy and Marc have an old project that's finally made its way back to the shop.

[ engine starting and idling ]

(Tommy)>> You might want to put your seatbelt on.

[ engine revving ]

(Marc)>> We brought this '69 Dodge Charger into the shop, tore it down, and replaced a bunch of sheet metal. Then after a bunch of hours of body work we gave it a jet black paint job, a vinyl roof, and red tail stripe. Then we shoe horned in a Hellcat drivetrain along with modern tubular suspension and disc brakes all the way around.

(Tommy)>> After that we sent our Charger up to Brighton, Michigan, to our buddy Mike Copeland and his shop Arrington Performance. They've done several of these swaps on old Mopars. So enlisted them to get all the components of that modern Hemi working with our old B-body chassis.

(Marc)>> And those guys knocked it out of the park. Think about it. This thing is a 707 horsepower Hellcrate from Mopar and to make that thing in daily driven applications the way they do in the factory Hellcats, well there's a lot of components that go into that, and getting all of those to work, well that's kinda difficult. Not only that but you have to make it look factory, and that's exactly what they've done. That's their specialty. Mike and the guys at Arrington know what they're doing and they killed it on this project. They've got everything hooked up from the factory wiring harnesses, cooling, plumbing, electrical, and it's all hooked up and ready to go as you can see by what we just did in the parking lot. You could say this thing's ready to light the fires and shred the tires anytime we want.

(Tommy)>> And speaking of tires you guys had to have noticed that this thing's got some new kicks up under it. We went with some beefy 20's here in the rear and some slightly smaller 18's up front. To doll up our Charger we went to Schott Performance Wheels for a set of their Accelerators with optional tri-bar spinners. They're made from forged billet aluminum and they're available in sizes ranging from 17 all the way up to 24's. We went with a titanium finish but they have six others to choose from. Then we wrapped them in a set of General G-max RS ultra-high performance tires. That way if we ever decide to take this thing to the track or just cruising on the streets we'll be prepared. Well I don't know about you but with this thing finally having a pulse I guess you could say it's kinda rekindled the fires for me.

(Marc)>> Well for me it's not so much the pulse of this thing but my pulse riding shotgun with you doing that big burnout out in the parking lot. That was awesome. I mean what's left on this car, it's the tedious stuff. It's not really my favorite but I am ready to get this car done and we are dangerously close.

(Tommy)>> I guess you could say all we lack is finishing up.

(Narrator)>> Don't go anywhere. Marc and Tommy start sliding in to the assembly of project "Hard Charger".

(Marc)>> Hey folks welcome back. Well we're busy digging through all of this old stuff so we can get our '69 Charger assembled. The first thing we're gonna attack is the windows. Well here's all the hardware for our driver's side quarter glass. There's a lot of moving parts here because not only does that glass go up and down but it also pivots while it does it. We just need to get all these parts out here and give them a good inspection to make sure everything's in good shape. One of the things you really have to look closely at is this regulator here because these teeth like to get worn down or even broken off, and the splines here were the crank itself attaches, sometimes those will get worn down as well. Ours looks good. And as for all this small stuff that's in the bag here we just need to look at every single thing, take an inventory, and see what needs to be cleaned up or replaced. Now some of this stuff can just go right in the blaster, but some of this other stuff needs to be replaced like these rollers here. They get cracked and brittle, and thankfully we can get those new. We're gonna show you just a little bit later, but as for this other stuff we need to get it over to the blaster and get it cleaned up.

(Tommy)>> While he's busy with all that I'm gonna get started on our side windows. We went to Classic Industries and got a full glass setup for our Charger. We didn't want to reuse all that old stuff because it's all scratched up. However we are gonna have to transfer some of the hardware from this stuff over to the new ones. To remove this piece it's pretty simple. We're just gonna persuade it off with a hammer. And then we'll run it over to the polisher to brighten everything up.

Some of these pieces aren't available in the aftermarket. So a little bit of elbow grease and some patience will have this trim looking new again. We want to set the glass on a sand bag to support it, and then we're gonna use a drill to remove the center of rivet. That way we reduce the chances of us busting glass. Then the new rivet can go in and get tapped into place. Now to put this piece on we've got to use glass setting tape. It's not very complicated. You just cut you a strip of this, fold it over the edge of the glass, and then using a hammer drive on your chrome trim, and then you just trim off the excess. It's that easy.

(Marc)>> We're gonna paint the pieces that I blasted using some Dupli-color engine enamel. The reason we're doing this is because it's a very durable paint and this silver is a very similar color to the factory galvanizing. We've got our painted parts ready to go and the parts I didn't need to paint, got those cleaned, got our glass right here, and the new hardware that I mentioned earlier, like these new rollers. You can see them compared to the old ones here. We just need to get these installed, get it all assembled. I'll get the glass installed onto the frame. Then I'll use some Permatex dielectric grease to lube up all the moving parts. Some people like to use white lithium but I like the durability of this stuff. Plus it's not water soluble. The regulator is next, followed by the main track. We'll get it flipped over, and then we need to install one bushing and the clip that holds it in. Now this thing's ready to go in the car.

(Tommy)>> Whenever working in your shop have you ever noticed how everything gets dirty and greasy, like your hands, your tools, the drawers to your tool box, or your work bench? There really hasn't been an easy way to clean all of those until now. These are the all-new Gunk wipes. They are an eight by 12 inch dual texture wipes with no scratching, no rinsing, and no residue, and they come in this moisture seal packaging so they won't dry out. They're safe to use on metal, vinyl, or even painted surfaces, and they're mild enough to use on your hands and arms. If you have any questions about what you've seen on today's show go to Powernation TV dot com.