Front Bumper Cover Fitment

[cntchds]

So I bought a Saleen style bumper last night, because I was convinced that the stock urethane bumper that I had before was just warped because the fender that was on the car when I bought it was all bent up from an accident, and the bumper was flush against that.

Not the best pic in the world since it was supposed to be of the brakes, not the bumper, but it is pretty visible. It was a good half inch gap.

Taking the old one off was a breeze, since I've done it a few times now. Pull the pushpins out of the top. Use an 11mm wrench to undo the nuts that hold the bumper to the fender... Oh wait... The new one doesn't have the mounting brackets on it...

As you can kind of see in that picture that mounting brackets are not there... Not only that, there aren't even holes drilled. Now this is weird, since the bumper definitely looks like it has had its fair share of usage.

Also notice that this bumper is not urethane like the stock bumper. It's fiberglass. Thick, hard fiberglass. Which means? It does not want to stretch at all. Which is good, just not during installation for a test fit.

So it's coming back off tomorrow to prep it for a final installation, but as it lays right now it seems like it's going to have the same problem as my last bumper. It has a 1" gap between the bumper and the fender at the back of the fender. I can press it to fit properly, and who knows, maybe the brackets will pull it closer together, but consider me pessimistic at this point. I'll figure out a way to close the gap though.

Here's the loose pics!

Does anyone have any tips and tricks on how to get it to align? I replaced the fender, so that shouldn't be the problem. I'm just out of ideas on why the passenger side fits so great when the driver's side is just terrible.

One other thing to note is that I did not install anything hard yet, including the screws to the back of the fender, which were not put in on the stock one since it could not stretch enough to align with the holes. This bumper could align with the hole if pressed, but I don't know how close it will be after the bracket is installed. If the screw is the only reason it's sitting weird, please feel free to scold me and tell me I'm an idiot. I'm only really concerned because of how great the passenger side fits "loose."

Thanks

 

[Mr.Bolt-on]

Make sure to mark the hole point's with a pencil. What I did was cut the end pieces of my stock bumper off, so I could lay the flat pieces against the new bumper to align my holes. I used the pencil to mark where to drill, and the same with putting the brackets on the bumper. If you get all the holes from your stock bumper aligned with your new bumper everything should fit and be snug. You may want to use some paper to mark the holes for the bumper, if you don't want to cut up your other one.

Also, you are going to get side skirts eventually right??? Because a saleen lower front bumper looks extremely out of place without matching skirts to even the car out. It should look great anyways.

 

[cntchds]

I do plan on eventually getting side skirts, yes, but I only really like the Saleen ones, but they don't allow for my side exhaust. I really want to figure out how to work fiberglass so I can fix a set of Saleens to allow for my side exhaust, but until then I'm going skirtless since I hate the step-style side skirts that come stock.

Thanks for the input!