Bumper owie.

Hi everyone. I don't post here often, but when I do, people are usually very helpful.

Had an incident this morning. I got a free coffee card yesterday at work, so decided to use it rather than make coffee like I usually do. I left early to allow time for this. But when I pulled up toward the stand, it was busier than I'd anticipated, and I had trepidation, fearing being late. So, I started to back up, and was checking my mirrors to avoid scraping a curb, but didn't see a car that had just pulled in behind me. Which makes me the idiot, because I have a backup camera. Guess backup cameras are only good if one is checking the screen!

Anyway, I was fortunate to have only bent the guy's license plate and frame, but seemingly little damage underneath. So, he may hit me up for a new plate, which I will gladly pay him for, being that I was at fault. Unfortunately for me, his plate sliced into my bumper, meaning I will owe nearly $700 out of pocket for a new bumper. Being that I have one year left on my lease, I may fight my OCD tendency to get it fixed right away, and opt to wait until near the time to turn it in, since bumper accidents are so common. (This is only my second accident with this car, but my former 2011 Elantra seemed to get hit every few months, and only once my fault.)

I learned this lesson from my mom, who had a bumper accident, then got the whole bumper replaced, then right after it was fixed, scraped it again! My only question: would there be any other options other than entire bumper replacement? Any lease experts in the mix?

Msquared said:

My only question: would there be any other options other than entire bumper replacement? Any lease experts in the mix?

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Yes, definitely. Google a local scratch and paintless dent repair guy. They do this type stuff all the time for dealers just trying to get a car sellable without spending a ton of money. This looks very doable!

Thanks for the advice.

Well, it turns out I'm in deeper water than I thought. Here we thought I bent his license plate, and it'd be maybe $50 for a new one. But today, he took it to a body shop. They pulled off the plate and there was a "puncture" underneath where the plate sits. And they want $500+ to fix it. So, before doing anything else, I called my insurance and a claims adjuster will be in contact w/me tomorrow.

I really thought I could get off easy w/this one. In past "fender benders" I've had, whether it be my fault or theirs, we've always let the little things slide and have resolved it with no insurance intervention. I think this guy's being a bit uptight about something that is not even visible, but then again, his car is pretty new (2014 Kia Rio.) I suppose if he went to sell it and they took the plate off, then it may be an issue. Who knows...

Face it, 500 for fixing a hole behind the license plate of a Kia, or take the money and make two car payments with it. He'll probably pocket the 500 and leave the car as is. That is cheesy but legal.

Shoot. You're so right. I hope the adjuster makes him take it to like 3 body shops and gives him the runaround, lol. He's not getting cash from me...like I even have that right now! :roll:

Back in 2004, I was driving a '93 Toyota pickup (stick, no power steering) and I had my foot slip off of the brake and get stuck between the pedals and I hit a professor's car at the college I was attending. It was an early '90's Honda Accord. Scratch went across the rear door, quarter panel, and side bumper. Insurance paid out $900 and months later, her car looked exactly the same as when I hit it.

That's what I get for leaving a note.

As someone on the other side, you are getting off cheap.

You cannot fix plastic bumpers like that properly, you have to replace them. You can sort of patch them in a cheezy way that sleaze ball used car dealerships do so that the repair fails after someone buys it, but to properly repair it you have to replace it.

The replacement cost on the Leaf rear bumper with paint and everything for me was about $1100. This is because some idiot rear ended my Leaf. It is about $2K to fix the door that someone else dented in while it was parked at a shopping centre and I was inside.

Wow, no offense intended, but that's very expensive for a simple bumper paint and replacement. I'm assuming there must have been other damage from your rear-end incident? I'm no body repair expert, but I've had enough collisions or family members who had incidences to know the average cost of certain body panel fixes or replacements. In fact, it seems to be the thing with my family now to ask around and/or play a guessing game as to what a particular repair will cost.

My mom has a '13 Jetta TDI Sportwagen, and damaged her bumper when backing into a low retaining wall. Bumper was replaced, painted, etc. Cost over $600. A few weeks later, she scratched it again! I'm learning from her mistake and waiting a good 6 to 9 months before getting this bumper fixed or replaced. My lease is up July 31, 2015 and I will not be keeping this car. Not because I hate it or anything, but I'm either going to upgrade to a new electric or go with a hybrid or diesel.

Msquared said:

Wow, no offense intended, but that's very expensive for a simple bumper paint and replacement. I'm assuming there must have been other damage from your rear-end incident? I'm no body repair expert, but I've had enough collisions or family members who had incidences to know the average cost of certain body panel fixes or replacements. In fact, it seems to be the thing with my family now to ask around and/or play a guessing game as to what a particular repair will cost.

My mom has a '13 Jetta TDI Sportwagen, and damaged her bumper when backing into a low retaining wall. Bumper was replaced, painted, etc. Cost over $600. A few weeks later, she scratched it again! I'm learning from her mistake and waiting a good 6 to 9 months before getting this bumper fixed or replaced. My lease is up July 31, 2015 and I will not be keeping this car. Not because I hate it or anything, but I'm either going to upgrade to a new electric or go with a hybrid or diesel.

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Pretty average around here. The body shop estimate came in under the insurance estimate. No other damage, just the bumper.

Can someone remind me why bumpers have to be made out of plastic?

I think the idea was that it's meant to be cheaper to fix and will flex in a slight accident. Neither appear to apply in practice.

Would seem simpler to make the outer skin of bumpers from thin metal that is cheap to make, or can be tapped back out if very minor. You also get the benefit that the paint can then be the same colour as the rest of the car, because painting on to plastic never gives you exactly the same colour as on metal, and it fades at a different rate so is worse still as the car ages.

bbrowncods said:

He'll probably pocket the 500 and leave the car as is. That is cheesy but legal.

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I don't really see that this is necessarily a bad practice because, whether the car is devalued or repaired, it is still a pecuniary remedy.

The comment that might be better made is to ask whether the devaluation value is always the same as the repair cost. I can imagine that may occasionally be the case but in general if the devaluation value is low compared with the repair cost, they should get that lower value unless they present receipts for the repair.

I just ran into a baby stroller on the highway (fortunately there was no baby in it). Unfortunately, it cracked the bumper near the hole where the fog lights might have been (had I purchased them). Also knocked out the removable plastic that is removed when you install fog lights. Any suggestions as far as repairing the bumper?

donald said:

Can someone remind me why bumpers have to be made out of plastic?

I think the idea was that it's meant to be cheaper to fix and will flex in a slight accident. Neither appear to apply in practice.

Would seem simpler to make the outer skin of bumpers from thin metal that is cheap to make, or can be tapped back out if very minor. You also get the benefit that the paint can then be the same colour as the rest of the car, because painting on to plastic never gives you exactly the same colour as on metal, and it fades at a different rate so is worse still as the car ages.

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The primary reason for plastic is to save weight.

http://sparebumper.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=44" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.plastics-car.com/Todays-Automobiles/Auto-Body-Exterior/Bumpers-Fascia-Systems.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
These websites talk about why bumpers are made the way that they are. I'm not sure that they are correct in all claims, but they talk as though they are well researched.

From those sides, I read that bumpers are plastic because:
1) They can take very low speed impact without visible damage
2) They can make more ornate shapes in plastic than in metal

It isn't said, but perhaps plastic bumpers are also cheaper.

Note: the plastic part is really a bumper cover. Under that plastic is often an impact-absorbing piece of foam and a strong metal bumper. I'll bet that the combination of a plastic cover, a foam absorber, and a metal under-bumper enables the bumper system to meet complex crash test standards less expensively than a metal-foam-metal system.

Bob

donald said:

Can someone remind me why bumpers have to be made out of plastic?

I think the idea was that it's meant to be cheaper to fix and will flex in a slight accident. Neither appear to apply in practice.

Would seem simpler to make the outer skin of bumpers from thin metal that is cheap to make, or can be tapped back out if very minor. You also get the benefit that the paint can then be the same colour as the rest of the car, because painting on to plastic never gives you exactly the same colour as on metal, and it fades at a different rate so is worse still as the car ages.

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Thin metal would not work well with US bumper standards which require that the car take an impact of 2.5 MPH (it was double that from 1974-1982) without damage to the lighting equipment of the car. That's why especially during the 5 MPH days most US-market cars had massive metal bumpers; if you've ever seen a US-spec European car and wondered why they had to have those massive bumpers as compared to the European versions, you can blame our bumper standards for that.

2k1Toaster said:

The replacement cost on the Leaf rear bumper with paint and everything for me was about $1100.

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FWIW I had my rear bumper replaced a couple of months ago for about $800. To answer the OP, these plastic bumpers are pretty much a replacement (no repair) sort of thing. Having said that, yours didn't look that bad (mine was cracked).