SteveWallace
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| posted on 8/6/14 at 03:48 PM |
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Repairing a Plastic Bumper
Went out for my first drive in my Viento today having got the V5C from DVLA yesterday and fitted the number plates this morning. Great fun, although
its going to take a while to learn to drive it at anywhere near its limit - put my foot down coming off a roundabout and was doing 80 before I knew it
On the way back, one of the indicator bulbs stopped working so, as it looked like it was going to rain, I swapped to the tin top and went to Halfrauds
for a new bulb - a fortuitous decision because on the way back I was rear ended at a roundabout - a classic case of the person following me looking at
the cars on the roundabout and not the car in front (me).
I have to say that my first reaction was thank God I wasn't in the Viento, or I would have had a major sense of humour failure.
To cut a long story short, I only have a relatively small wrinkle and dent in the middle of my plastic bumper where it deformed and didn't quite
return to its original shape. I would prefer to repair it myself.
How easy is it to do, is there a particular method and what are the materials that I need? Anything on the market that I should avoid? I've
repaired metal body work before but clearly normal bodge is not appropriate as its a flexible bumper.
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Slimy38
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| posted on 8/6/14 at 03:55 PM |
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A similar dent on my wife's car was resolved with a hot air gun and a press with a piece of wood from the other side. It didn't even need
touching up, and you can only see the dent if you look really closely.
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britishtrident
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| posted on 8/6/14 at 04:33 PM |
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A clothes iron heating the bumper through an old dish cloth is also a god way to heat the plastic.
Because plastic is a poor conductor of heat, you need to great slowly to get the plastic heated through full thickness.
[Edited on 8/6/14 by britishtrident]
[I] “ What use our work, Bennet, if we cannot care for those we love? .”
― From BBC TV/Amazon's Ripper Street.
[/I]
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owelly
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| posted on 8/6/14 at 04:42 PM |
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My mate reversed our hire van into a wall which pushed the end of the plastic bumber into a bowl-shape!
I poured kettles of boiling water over it whilst pushing the bulge out of the bumper. It popped back out and only left two tiny white stretch-marks.
http://www.ppcmag.co.uk
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