Rear 1/4 side reflectors

[Talan423]

does anybody happen to know the approx. date in which ford changed over from the color-keyed inset rear 1/4 side reflectors to the cougar style? i'm looking at a non-gt/cs car for my friend and the build date is 03/07/68, it is a dearborn car and it has the colored side reflectors. i thought this was a little late to have these reflectors? my gt/cs was built on 03/15/68 and it has the cougar reflectors, is it possible dearborn went longer than san jose? for some reason i thought they all changed in january 68? i am wondering if these 1/4's have been replaced?

thanks for any help!

tom

 

[joedls]

Mine was a Feb 13 build and had the early reflectors.

 

[CALIF GIRL]

Mine was built Feb 19 and has the cougar type

 

[HappyHour]

Mine born on Feb 9th and I have the early 68 panel with the indented side marker lights. Im not sure about the Cougar style.

I understood after mid-Feb Ford went back to the 67 quarters panels with the flush marker lights.

http://www.californiaspecial.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5591

 

[case12]

There have been other posts on this, and though no one knows for sure, the general concensus was mid-February. That is for the San Jose cars. Not sure if that holds true for other factories. Obviously it was a demand of supply, and when the inset quarter panels ran out, they switched over to the chrome trimmed reflectors. I am not sure if we would ever know the exact date - ex; if a pallet of old quarter panels was found in the factory a month later, would they pull them over and still use them - probably so - but that is just a fictitious scenario. My two cents from looking at this before. Casey

 

[Talan423]

now that i am seeing the change at san jose came in approx. mid february, maybe an early march car from dearborn could possibly have had the inset colored type of reflectors. for some reason i thought the change came on jan. 15th, which i believe would make too big of a date gap .

thanks
tom

 

[PNewitt]

Yes, the change was in mid-Feb. But--cars may not reflect (no pun) this, because of the variations from the prescribed build date, and when it left the factory--can vary about two weeks up or down.

The reason they did this was that they couldn't get enough '68 rear quarters after the strike to be shipped by rail from Dearborn, so they decided to make & get the '67 type, and add a reflector with a Montego part number. This was also a cost-saving effort to come up with more $$ for the workers from the settled strike in late '67 (we owe part of the GT/CS's existence to this strike)

This same reflector was used on the Cougar, if you notice, it's the same shape for the front parking lights on the Cougar, too.

A side note-- the Shelby inset reflectors were chrome plated. The CS version was body color.

I have to ask--was this rear reflector change the same for all three factories--or just San Jose? Did NJ and Dearborn also change during Mid Feb?
Who owns a non-San Jose produced '68, built in Late Feb/early March '68 to tell us what is what?

Paul N.