Plastic bumper repair (photo of damage)

[dave 911]

I'm looking at a used car with my son (Scion tC), and the rear bumper has this damage - what are we looking at in terms of repair costs here? Can something like this be repaired by us at home?


Other than a few dings here and there the rest of the body is pretty straight.

[HardDrive]

Because the car is black, you could do a reasonably good repair job at home. Might be easier to simply source a new bumper cover and bolt it on.

[Esel Mann]

The problem is you are possibly only seeing the damage of the plastic bumper cover and not what is underneath. Until one pulls that off it is anyone's guess as to what the extent of the real damage is.

If it turns out it is simply the plastic bumper cover, as far as repairing it at home, one possible cost effective route is to find one in a junk yard which color matches.

Brand new they are not cheap and if it doesn't come already color matched you will then be dealing with having to paint it which if you don't have the setup to do so, will raise the cost even more.

[JAR0023]

Nasty stretches and a significant tear. At a shop three to four hours repair. Two to paint plus materials. $6-700 at a shop. There are plenty of shops that don't have a bodyman with the skills to repair that cover. See below, cost of an a/m cover is about even with repair costs. Most shops will slap on a new cover.

I'm assuming since you are asking here you are not a bodyman. As previously suggested your best bet is to locate a used cover in the same color. Non-metallic black is an easy match. If you can find a used cover it will look fine.

Looks like used can be sourced for $150 or so and aftermarket will be $225 ish unpainted.

www.car-part.com is a good start for a used cover.

LKQ Corporation - Parts Search another place to search for used and aftermarket.


-J

[Bill Douglas]

Assuming the bullet stopped after the bumper and didn't do further damage inside


I'd do a quick and nasty repair on it as the kid will probably dent it in much the same place anyway. And next time it gets dented the insurance company can pay for a proper fix on it.

[Evans, Marv]

My wife hit a coyote with her last car (Camry), but of course that was a front bumper. I shopped around for a replacement and paint for the bumper. Most of the estimates were $1,200 to $1,400. Behind the bumper was mostly styrofoam. The windshield washer bottle was knocked askew a bit. I bought a new bumper from Toyota for around $175, popped the old one off, fixed the washer bottle, & put the new one on. She complained about the paint having little pits on the front & a couple of side scratches from parking lots. So to make her happy, I got a middle of the road paint job at MAACO for $800. She was happy as a clam, and the car looked decent for a total of $975. Later on when we put it up for sale, the first person to look at it bought it.

[aigel]

$700 for paint and install plus the part.

That's my best guess. Maybe a little less due to cheaper labor location.

As others have mentioned, I'd buy a used bumper and order some rattle cans at paintscratch.com and get it to look half way decent. Savings: $600.

G

[drcoastline]

Dave as Esel Man stated make sure there isn't more significant damage behind the plastic. If your satisfied the vehicle is sound otherwise the bumper is repairable by you at home. Lots of youtube videos on repairing plastic bumpers. You need to plastic weld the tear and fill the hole. The trick is when sanding plastic it creates little "hairs" that can/will show up in the finish coat if not removed. So youtube plastic bumper repair. Supplies will cost a few hundred dollars. My local jobber will mix half quarts of paint for small jobs or hit it with Duplicolor from a rattle can if you don't need it perfect.

My guess it would be easier to source a used bumper from a you-pull-it yard or from Ebay (there's one on there now for $135.00). but it can be repaired if you want to give it a try. Either way it's a good father son project.

Good luck

[onewhippedpuppy]

New bumper cover, done. How old is your son? If he's a teen, he'll be doing some "parking by feel" anyway.