Refinishing Aluminum Bumpers

Your's will be worth more to you than any new car you can buy. The satisfaction of doing it yourself is priceless. Besides my front bumper won't fit a Fairmont. It's not straight like the Fairmont as it curves around the grill which sticks out pass the headlights and inch or two.

 

There just aren't any out there that turn my crank, except the New Beetle Convertible.

But you're right, it is priceless to my wife and I. She's been great to us, and it's her turn for a new makeup.

 

Speaking of bumpers - New car bumpers failed

Luxury car bumpers not up to task: insurance report
http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2007/08/02/bumpers.html

Here's the Insurance Bureau's results:
http://www.iihs.org/sr/pdfs/sr4208.pdf

A 5 to 11 km/hour nudge leaves from $5200 to $14,000 in damages?

Still cleaning all my brackets, crusty old things, but still solid!

 

Do your bumpers have the shock absorbers? Mine does and they work by the way....don't ask how I know.:banghead3:

 

Yeah, mine does, but the '78 had rigid extensions holding the bumper to the frame. On the back though, they are the rigid type. I once skidded into a snowbank and figured my bumper was bent to hades, but all was well. When I took it all off the other day, everything was fine - nothing warped or bent out of shape.

The '78 came without the rear bumper, some inebriated lady backed into the guy's car at a 50 foot distance and squashed the whole rear end halfway to the axle! I'm sure it was a Toronto car, because they use roadsalt like they own the salt mines!

Did it hurt, when you found out it had bumper shocks?

 

Well I got the rear bumper cleaned up, but the pits were pretty deep. Tires spinning in salt laden snow can do that. My utility trailer box sits above the tires, so they throw dust and dirt forward to the bumper too, so I'll have to find some nice 1982 Cougar Wagon Stainless Steel bumpers, eventually. It only took an afternoon to take them both off.

I'll bet the frame supports/shocks are the same distance apart, so I'll have to change the headlight and grille setup. It'll be a Fairer Cougarmont!

Anyway, I figured I'd start with wiping off the roadtar, paint overspray, and so on. Then I figured I'd start with 400-grit and go up from there. Once I saw how deep the pits were, I thought about a Plan C. I bought a can of Duplicolor's Chrome Paint for other parts a few months ago, so I figured I'd try it. I'll sand it down and put a couple of clear coats on it. It does look PDG though. At least I'll have time to snoop for a Cougar setup.

 

I'm not happy with the results, but it will do until I find better ones. I got one huge surprise though - the 1978 donor had only the front bumper since the rear end was 'pancacked', and the black plastic inserts were from a 1980-1982 Fairmont "E0BB xxxxxx xxx", and the bumper was so oxidized that the mounting holes fell apart when I loosened the brackets from the bumper to get the plastic trim off (some of mine were pretty scratched up.)

I do like those 1982 Cougar wagon stainless steel bumpers. I wonder if the LTD II bumpers are similar.

 

I tested the bumper/grille installation a while back, and realized that the bumpers are adjustable to finish up square to everything. I kept wondering why the grille looked skewed, off-kiltered. Anyway those guys go on tomorrow after we warm up from -19C (-2F) around 11:00 AM to a more humane -5C (23F).

It's getting darker and colder by 4:00 PM, but I've got the seats to modify (rear seat sedan upholstery converted to stationwagon width. Nice thing that they're the same height.

It never got over -14C windchill (-7C real temp) and the wind picked up, so I boned up on the wiring harnesses and tagged them all.

Then we get close to 0C (32F for a few days). Look Jane! Look! See the dog run... like...