Fixin' a fender-bender

[Jand3rson]

I didn't make it public before, but I very moderately R3V'd my car about a month ago. I didn't slow down in time for a woman that slammed on her brakes for a yellow light in front of me, and in an effort to avoid her, veered left and very lightly rear-ended the car in the left lane. The replacement fender I got from dps1 turned out to be a PILE OF MONKEY SHIT, so I decided to fix mine. Here's what we've got so far:

Here it is munched:


Here it is straightened back out, with some temp primer just to see where the low spots are. Andrew did the straightening, and did a VERY good job:


Here it is today after some sanding and a bit more straightening:


Also since I'm going to have to have it resprayed, I fixed all of the chips and knicks, and roughed up the whole surface with a paint removal wheel. I've got some black high-build primer on the way to fill in the low spots (white areas), they're not nearly deep enough to need bondo.

[kamotors]

very cool, can't wait to see how it turns out.

[Desaevious]

As I was in search of a schwarz driver's fender I figured it was rust or an accident. Since you repainted it a few years back I figured you were hit/hit something. I'm glad that even though you got screwed over by that dps1 fender you managed to straighten it back up with fillers.

A cracked bumper cover is always a bitch, I had that happen. Mine was about half of that size and I managed to layer screening until I tigerhaired it...I managed to even make it look flush with where the cover dips down towards the trim. Then again I was cheap so do what you want. Whichever, good luck.

[Jand3rson]

I MIGHT try to fix that bumper cover the way you suggested, or another way. I have a book I bought on how to repair plastic bodywork, so maybe I'll crack that guy open.

My fender had not been repainted before however, this is the first time it's had any repairs or anything like that.

[e30this]

Looks really good, If you didnt already buy a bumper skin. I used a 3M 2 part epoxy to fix a crack/missing piece in my rear bumper and it worked great.
I can get you the info if you want.

[Jand3rson]

I haven't bought one yet, I'm kind of holding out to see if the U-Pull-It gets a late model in. Shipping on one of those would be a bitch, and it will be hard to find someone that is selling just the skin. So I'm either going to fix it or get one that way, we'll see what happens. I would just drive up and get one from Joe, but I still owe him money for something else, so that wouldn't be too cool of me until I pay him.

[Desaevious]

I also had a bitch finding a late model bumper. I waited a year until a parts yard finally got one in and I pounced at it. Shipping is a real bitch on these but luckily I managed to score one at at parts yard for $80. Like I did, you could do a DYI to "patch it up" until you find one. The epoxy idea E30this suggest is a good one too, but I already had tigerhair material laying around.

[Kristeun]

My passenger fender looks almost exactly the same as yours did. Wish I knew how the mend it :(

[E30_Pare]

sigh... I too have recently gotten into a small fender bender. Instead of fixing it I headed to our locale yard and picked up a hood and fender on the cheap. Anyways nice work on the fender.

[IRON-E]

sigh... I too have recently gotten into a small fender bender. Instead of fixing it I headed to our locale yard and picked up a hood and fender on the cheap. Anyways nice work on the fender.

shame, shame, shame you could have been out for the drive tomorrow. :finger:

[Jand3rson]

Just picked up a can of black SEM high build primer, and did the first coat. I'll always stand behind SEM's products, the adhesion and how well it goes on is amazing. After a few coats, I'll get a few pics. This stuff should be more than enough to build up the low spots and get it pretty damn close to perfect again.

[SamE30e]

Who stops at a yellow light?

But looks like it's coming along for sure. I need to learn how to do some body work, maybe fix that thing I call a passenger door.

[BeirBrennerE30]

that looks really good. I woudl always prefer a numbers matching properly repaired fender over a "DOT R" fender anyday.

[Jand3rson]

Well, the SEM primer was a bust. Not long after I posted that, the primer reacted to some of the old existing primer/paint on the fender in the bad spots I'd sanded out. It wrinkled up, and didn't dry correctly, and when I tried to sand it out, it just started crumbling up like not-quite-dried-bondo. Not sure what the problem was, it was probably just something in the old paint/primer that wasn't compatible and reacted. I'm going to take it down tomorrow and just have it media blasted and start from scratch.

[Ray Smoodiver]

Did you add yourself to the list :p