Customs Attention Custom guys! What do you do with the back of a 58 Ford?

While so many of the nice customizing tricks that work so well for the front of a '57 Ford work well for the '58, the rear is whole different story. So what do you do with it? I haven't seen too many examples of old customs. Aside from the impossible to find '59 Bonneville lights, or lining up multiple '59 Cadillacs, what are some of your ideas for customizing the rear of a '58 Ford? Get creative! Extended tail fins, totally different tail lights, grafting on the rear of a '57... what have ya got?

 

Look at a Larry Watson painted one done for Johnny Taylor then do it with your twist.

 

Johnny Taylor's '58 is pretty much the gold standard for customized '58 Fords. No question. But there seems to be a dearth of nicely customized cars, especially when it comes to the rear end treatment. It's a shame because the shape of the car and especially the trunk give lots of great lines to play with, but with the rear end treatment, it seems everybody cops out to something easy.

 

Here is one

 

You might try running into it with a cement truck.

 

Ha. Truer words never spoken

 

If it were mine, I would remove the plastic biscuits and make Lucite Plastic lens . I has to be made in 2 pieces one piece for the fender and another for the trunk lid . I made lens for my 40 Hudson coupe. cut with a jig saw ,,put them in an oven /heated shaped them by hand wearing leather gloves. was fast and easy , looked super . You can buy blue dots jewels , drill a hole and glue them in .

 

I can't seem to find an example other than this,but I've seen tube grilles over the tail light area....maybe over a flat Lucite red panel like what was suggested

http://image.customrodder.com/f/898...o_Door_Gold_Body_P***enger_Side_Rear_View.jpg

 

'58 Edsel tunneled into reshaped housings are worth a thought.


(picture courtesy Steve Johnson, via oldcarandtruckpictures.com)


Or simple 'Egg-Crate" grilles, such as on the A-Bros. "Perfidia".
(I still like the turn-down shape of the Edsel light.)

 

Or take that Perfidia idea, french in the grills, and add a set of '60 T-bird lenses on top.

Maybe make the two ovals one elongated oval, fill in the indentation on the decklid, and pancake it for good measure. With more space to work with, you have even more possibilities.

 

Bonneville tailights. I'm looking for some too.

 

Don't cross bred it with 59 caddy lights..caddy lights look good on 59 caddys, on anything else they look like ****..

 

Couldn't agree with you more.

 

Joe, I've been thinking about it for quite a bit, since you told me about your purchase. I finall got a pretty good idea, unique, but period correct, if you like. I'll PM you, as I'd hate someone to steal the idea!

 

Heres a thought

 

Thats kick ***!!!!

 

I like that!!! Not sure about the license plate though.

 

The plate is pretty funny, car is kick***!

 

Simple and clean. ....not as brilliant as the cement truck idea...but not bad!!!

 

I always wondered what it would look like with three taillights.

 

On mine, I want to use the front 6" of a 61(?, the one with 2 openings) chevy truck hood for my rear roll pan. Extend the fins a little, cut the trunk around the taillights (to make the taillight panels one piece)...thought about using 68 cougar sequential taillights, but behind some custom lenses.


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One of the ugliest ideas Ford ever produced was that rear end. On the 58 convertible I used to have, I bought a 57 parts car and was going to convert the back to a 57 so it would look more pleasing and more adaptable to customization. But I traded it off and never got around to it. The conversion looked simple enough. Just change the trunk lid and the sections with the taillights.

 

I agree in part. I think the tail lights are terrible, but the deck lid is awesome. That body line plays so well towards the late 50s and 60s customs, it can be scalloped or paneled out, scooped... all kinds of good stuff. It's really just the tail lights that **** bad and need fixing.

 

http://public.fotki.com/TUFFTIN/featured-cars/lonnies580006.html

 

It'll be interesting to see what you guys come up with . Car styling tends to be a personal thing and I've always disliked the '58 and '59 styling , especially after Ford hit a home run ( IMO ) on the '55 , '56 , and '57 .

T

 

I like this looks simple enoughbut clean.Maybe remove the sunken section of the bootlid an fit a nice bumper and licence plate frame so the licence plate mounts on the bumper.Still not as easy as the cement truck option though.The *** end of these cars .std. look like a bad kustom.

 

This's what i was refering to.

 

*** 454 may be the best I've seen. I'm a Chevy guy with no imagination but I did own a '58 Ranchero for awhile. The '58 taillights have always been odd to me.

 

I like the 58 back , especially compared to the 59.

 

since ford was trying to make the 58 ford look as close to the 58 t -bird as possible which i really dont understand why did they feel the need to have two car models resembel each other soo closly

but anyway kinda along the lines of what chrisbcritter posted how about using the the entire 58-59 t-bird tailight ***emblys deeply frenched into the body/ trunk, the only real problem i could see is the fact that the fords taillight is split between the trunklid and the body

you could also lay the center of the trunklid back like the t-bird (i think this is one area they messed up on the ford )

i like the 58 but not nearly as much as the 57