The Grille Does Its Job

Ah,the under-appreciated grille! It is so sad that this crucial car part doesn’t get its just due. Not only does it serve a useful purpose but on many cars it just looks COOL!

The purpose of a grille, and yes, it has a purpose, is to allow air to flow to the engine, thus cooling it down. If it weren’t there you would be parked along the side of road watching steam billow out of your radiator and that just wouldn’t be good, although passersby would enjoy the show for sure.

The other thing it does is make your vehicle look unique. If you have ever seen the distinctive grille on a BMW or an Audi or even one of the old Edsels you will know what we are talking about. You can see an Edsel coming from a mile away and know it is an Edsel because of that grille. Sure, the negative folks will say the grille was one reason the Edsel didn’t sell but let’s ignore those folks for the time being. The point is that the grille on an Edsel was a distinctive feature that did what it was supposed to do and that’s all you can ask for in a grille.

Grilles are made of plastic in most cases nowadays but in the old days they were made of steel or chrome, a steel byproduct. Today we see more and more customized grilles that sell as aftermarket parts and they are quite expensive. Oh, depending on the location of the grille it may also be used to cool the brakes. So you see, the grille is a fairly important feature on your vehicle.

Are they hard to replace? Not really; most grilles can be taken off by simply removing several bolts, which leads us to wonder why more people don’t do the replacement themselves. Listen, if you want to pay top dollar for a new grille that’s all well and good; the other alternative, of course, is to go to a salvage yard and save up to 50% on the price, not to mention the labor that you would pay an arm and a leg for. Self serve salvage yards like Cash-n-Carry give huge discounts if you are willing to grab your tools and “You Pull It.”

We can understand if you don’t want to try and replace a transmission or a fuel pump, but a grille is child’s play compared to those jobs. Head on down to our Savannah salvage yard and find out for yourself just how easy a job this truly is.