Hi all, New Prius owners here! We just picked up a used 2010 Gen III Prius "for our daughter to drive". I'm not so sure how much she will be driving it - because *I* love the car! I'm glad to say that the car is in excellent condition..with one small caveat. Unfortunately, there is a small 'tear' in the front bumper on the passenger side. I obviously missed this when I inspected the car prior to purchase. The previous owner must have hit a snowbank over the winter..or something like that. At any rate, here are a couple of pictures of it. It seems like it may be an easy repair if I could somehow get at it from the back to attach a small reinforcement piece. Has anyone done something like this? It certainly doesn't need to be perfect...I just want to prevent the tear from getting larger. By the way, it looks like a friendly and knowledgeable bunch here. Thanks!
I don't think that bumper would tear much more, unless of course you rub up against a curb a few more times. That rusty looking screw/bolt will keep the bumper from tearing up too much. Since it's that far down and you won't stick your head down there to look at it. You can try some clear bonding agent and then use touchup paint to make it match......but of course, it could look worse when the bonding agent doesn't hold and starts to come apart. So if it were me, I would leave it.
Ya I guess it isn't very noticeable. However, if it is a 'easy' repair then I thought I would give it a shot. Just trying to see if anyone else has repaired a similar tear..and if so, how they did it.
I have fixed a few split bumpers and the best way to do it (at least that I have found) is to remove the bumper from the car and melt the plastic back together from the inside with a wide tip soldering iron than reinforce the area with another piece of plastic and two part epoxy. the chemical reaction bonds it all together..
Interesting. The problem in this situation is that the area where the split is seems 'structural'. By that I mean that it takes a bit of force to pull the two pieces back together - and that force will have to be handled by the repair. Do you think the bond will be strong enough? I'm probably overthinking this though ( it's the engineer in me I guess ). Thanks much for your help!
welcome and congrats! i have a similar tear from hitting a huge raccoon. i just ignore it. all the best with your repair, and your prius!.
the way I did mine was using painters blue tape on the outside to hold it together, I used a wide tips soldering iron the old kind that looks like a gun with a trigger and "welded" the plastic together from the side...than mixed the full tubes of epoxy over the area and used the a plastic butter tub in the epoxy that followed the curve of the bumper...once its off the car theres no stress on the plastic and after it cures its a solid peice
Interesting stuff. Thanks! I was also poking around youtube and found this. It is a similar technique but embeds metal screening into the plastic for reinforcement. I guess I have yet another project to do!
Yep that is certainly an option! I'm headed that way...for now...because I don't want to remove the bumper until I have more time to work on it.
