[camaromb]

The grille stiffener was certainly painted separately, you can see clamp lines and drips in the original paint on the stiffeners typically and the screws are not painted. My blue rs has very little blue on the top of the grille but the stiffener is completely blue. The stripe tape lines are very clean going under the header panel behind the grille. With the rs headlight squirters/hardware and other items that were installed after the grille was painted it should have been separate from the front end for ease of assembly later I would think.