A lil bumper repair before and after. 56k Pack a big lunch!!!
-
So I got my sweet ride with one major blemish. The front bumper has a big tear in it. ?Now being its a sweet ass "aero" bumper, I had to get it fixed. Being the handy (and cheap) fella that I would like to think I am, I figured I'd try to repair it myself. First thing I did is stroll down to my local parts store/body shop supplier to get the skinny on what was used to do such a repair. Less than $80 later, I'm out the door. Here's what I ended up purchasing.
The patch panels are pretty much just sound deadening and in this case were pretty much useless. It took me an hour of trying to make that work to realize it.
So anyway on to the repair.
Here's what I started with.... N otice the nice lil frankenstien stich holes that the previous owner made to keep it intact. SWEET!!!
Here's the actual adhesive/filler in its un mixed form.
Remember this pic?
See that calking gun? Aint no way in hell thatll work for this stuff. Im a big guy and I struggled to even get it to come out. So, a different plan was in order. I had to take the tip off and squirt a little bit onto a pallet to mix the old fasioned way, with a putty spreader.
O.K. now the hardest part of this repair happens now. Remember the patch panels I posted a pic of earlier? They are supposed to give you some backing and hold the panel together so to speak while the adhesive sets up. Well, that too wasnt going to happen. So I ended up mixing a little bit up, putting it on the front most part of the bumper, and holding it for 15-20 minutes for it to set up solid so It would hold its shape.
This was hard because the bumper itself wanted to go every which way but where it was supposed to go.
Next, went to the lower portion of the bumper and applied some more adhesive to the outer part of the bumper. I only went about 2/3 the way back because again, it didnt want to stay flush. So, another 20 minutes gone holding it in place.
After that set up, I wanted to give it some structural integrity so I mixed up a good size glob of the stuff and went to the backside of what I just repaired and let the love flow so to speak.
Note the zip tie i put back in the bumper. I had to do this while I was doing the job to keep the two pieces in somewhat close proximity to each other to make the bond.
The rest of the filling consists of the same thing. I went to the rear most part of the lower section first and finished both outside and inside filling. then to the upper (opening) area to do the same.
Here's what it looked like after my initial sanding with the da. Btw, all sanding on this was done with 180 grit sandpaper.
So then I added some more to fill in the imperfections and here's the semi finished result. Had to touch it up a lil more after this.
And here's a closeup ready for primer. Notice that you can still see the the actual rip area. It is only visible and unable to be felt so it should caover up fine.
Here's some finished product pice taken right after I washed it off. I wanted to take pics of it wet to show the visible repair. It turned out great imho. Tomorrow it get some primer.
-
looks good!
-
Wes, For better strength use a metal screen on the back side of the bumper around the repair. Also if it cracks on you again , you might want to talk to Matt Johnson and ask to use his plastic welder. He used to do bumpers for me @ SLD now he does bumper repair full time @ Corwins..
3M makes some nice products for bumper repair.. If you need a nice mini paint gun I'll let you use mine.Looking good!!
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login