Thread: Awful morning - I messed up my car :( (please help)

Hey guys.

This morning's been pretty crappy at work - and then when I was between buildings, I scraped my front passenger's side bumper up against a pole. It's got a pretty good sized dent near the fog light.

I'm debating on whether or not to claim it. I have a 500 dollar deductible, but it looks like one could be had online for around 300 - it'd obviously need painting, though.

Needless to say, I'm a little shaken up at the moment, but any advice on how best to go about this would be much appreciated.

Thanks.

Hate to hear that....Keep an eye on the parts & demods section of the forums. Sometimes auto body parts show up.

Thanks for the replies.
Needless to say, I wasn't in the best of states when I made the initial post - I'm a little more calm now, at least.

Here's a picture of the damage:

It's obviously more than a scape (as I initially described it), as you can see. There's also some cracking.

I talked to my insurance folks and they said I didn't need to act immediately. I should have time to go get a quote on the damage within a week, at that point I'll decide whether or not to file a claim.

I don't know anything about autobody work, or the costs associated with it. Any idea what to expect?

I think the psychological damage from the event was greater than or equal to the physical damage to the car. I just feel like such a moron for letting stress get to me so much that it impacted how careful I was being behind the wheel.

On the bright side though - at least it was low speed and just a pole, and not another car, or godforbid, another person.

Check ebay also.

Funny, had to do the same thing to the driver side of my car in the same spot. x_x

Wow guys, thanks for the suggestions. Maybe I'll be able to get it taken care of on my own.
I suppose I can't make it any worse by giving it a shot. I don't think I'll get a chance to spend much time working on it until mid next week though.

Quicklynx - I'd love for you to keep an eye out for me. I'm located in just north of Portland, OR. I'll have to call around to see if anything's available, myself.

I feel better already

Originally Posted by kyle99gtp

get behind there, puch the dent back out, and take some rubbing compund to it. i bet it cleans up very nicely.

edit: let me clarify. i hit a curb about a year ago, and my bumper looked like this.




i pushed the plastic back out, took some polishing compound to it and it looked like this.



then i took a heat gun and some screwdrivers and bent the plastic back to its original shape, and took some filler putty



and then repainted that area with some spray paint touchup and it looks almost perfect

I've got my hands on a heat gun and I'm gonna give this stuff a shot over the weekend (assuming the weather doesn't go to hell). I'll document it and keep ya'll updated.

Originally Posted by GTPJOE90

lemme no how the heart gun works on the cracks and stuff if its good in the spring i wanna fix mine up but with my bronzemist i would have to bring it somewhere and have them get the color and paint it right =[

I've been Googling and it looks like you can get paint that matches the manufacturer's color. I'll worry about that if/when I get the actual dent figured out. Now that I've spent some time researching, the project seems as though it's something I might be able to handle.

That said, I'm thinking I may need to remove the bumper cover from the vehicle... I'm really hoping I can do everything I need to do through the fog light hole, but I have no idea what's behind there. I've looked around but didn't have much luck finding directions for pulling the front bumper cover for the '04-'08s. Anyone have any experience with this?

Additionally (mods/admins) - if there's a subforum where this thread is more appropriate, please feel free to move it - I promise I won't take any offense

Check it out guys!
Spent a couple hours with a heatgun, and then a bit of wet/dry paper. Needless to say I'll need to hit it with some filling compound and sand, but I feel pretty good about the results so far!

Before:


After:



Put back together:



I've never done body work before (of any kind) and while this is certainly different than working with the hardbody - I'm thinking all I'll need to pay for in terms of labor now is paint. But I'll cross that bridge when I get to it. Considering it doesn't look *awful* anymore the rest of the project will probably need to go on hold for the time being.

Thanks for the continued support!

That looks freakin' awsome bro. Great job.

I've got peeling paint, numerous scrapes, gouges in the 98 GT I have. Have a pre-painted bumper cover coming from a place that sells them on ebay and will post back here when it comes in. Was under $300 shipped.