A close shave - bumper fun
Discussion
Driving about the other day some geezer in a white van starts flashing me on the motorway. Strange.
Anyhow I pull off at the next exit anyway, when I get onto the A road there's a strange scraping noise from the back. So I'm thinking the exhaust might have dropped or something. Luckily there's a layby so I pull in to find...
The bumper has dropped off and is hanging on by one side bolt!
Both of the main brackets have rusted through completely, and the offside side bolt had ripped out of the fibreglass.
Luckily not much damage done, just a scrape on one bottom corner of the bumper, just as well it didn't part company a couple of miles earlier! Bumper put in the passenger seat for the trip home...
So now I'll be making up some new brackets out of stainless. The old ones simply aren't protected under there, or indeed visible for inspection.
I'd have a check if I were you, fellow wedgers, there must be more cars out there where these mounts have all but rusted away.
After I bumped my car I found the brackets were shot to hell so I chopped them out and made new ones...
http://www.wedgeneering.co.uk/TVR%20Miscellany.htm...
http://www.wedgeneering.co.uk/TVR%20Miscellany.htm...
Well, the bumper is back on, nice and solid. First a couple of shots of the old mounts - or what's left of them.....
So I then found some sheet stainless in the barn, cut it up, bent it and welded up some new mounts. Look away now if you're scared of seeing ugly welding!!! I think the gas is running a little low in the MIG. But it's strong enough.
Then I glassed in the mounts where the old ones used to be:
I made the new mounts about 5mm longer than the old ones. This eliminated about 700g of metal in the form of washers from the car - in between the bumper mounts and the tub they use these enormous 4" 'penny' washers that weigh an absolute ton! So now there's just a few on each side. This could be a handy weight-saving upgrade for any 350i racers out there.
It all fitted back a treat and now doesn't wobble about at all - which makes a change.
So I then found some sheet stainless in the barn, cut it up, bent it and welded up some new mounts. Look away now if you're scared of seeing ugly welding!!! I think the gas is running a little low in the MIG. But it's strong enough.
Then I glassed in the mounts where the old ones used to be:
I made the new mounts about 5mm longer than the old ones. This eliminated about 700g of metal in the form of washers from the car - in between the bumper mounts and the tub they use these enormous 4" 'penny' washers that weigh an absolute ton! So now there's just a few on each side. This could be a handy weight-saving upgrade for any 350i racers out there.
It all fitted back a treat and now doesn't wobble about at all - which makes a change.
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