My rear bumper was hit on one side when I bought the car. The metal braket that mount to the body was bent and the plastic bumper is trash. I bought a used plastic bumper from someone and a used metal bumper mount from someone else. Whats the best way to put it all together? Should I bolt the metal pieces to the body first, then snap the plastic bumper into the metal bumper mount? Will that work and is that the best way to do it?
You need the plastic off in order to get the bolts in the bumper don't you? it should be pretty straight forward, pretty sure metal then plastic however lol.
The plastic bumper has about approx 8 or more clips which snap into corresponding square holes in the metal bumper mount. What I am unsure of is whether I can get all the clips snapped in with the metal bumper mount installed on the car first. I think it is possible to assemble everything off the car first (metal and plastic), slide the whole thing into the chassis, line up the 17 mm bolt holes and tighten. I have the metal mounted now so will try it that way first. Mods, if you think this thread should be moved, please do so.
Install bumper skin to metal frame (with brackets attached). Then carefully slip the brackets in place, and have a friend align the sides of the bumper onto the tabs on the body.
You need to have those 8 clips on the skin, otherwise the bumper cover will fly off.
I finally got around to putting the rear bumper skin back on. Since the metal bumper mount was already on the car I thought I'd give it a go as is. I scraped the rust off the edges of the 10 square holes in the metal bumper mount and lubed them with Vaseline. I also lubed the 10 corresponding plastic clips of the bumper skin. Lined the bumper skin up and gave the center a few good kicks but it would pop right back out. So I tried kicking starting from one corner but the other corner would pop off the side support. I then used an 8 foot long 2 x 4 and wedged one corner of the bumper skin and kicked the other corner and continue to the wedged corner. Worked like a charm! Afterwards, I looked under with a light and made sure all 10 clips did snap in all the way. It was an easy job!