Hi,
I'm installing a fg bumper onto my wife's celica. Overall, it's a good fit and easy install, but there's a couple of gaps I would like to fix/fill, and I'm not sure how to go about it. So, if I can get some advice/ how to info from some of the experts here, that'll be great. Any sites, or pics would also work. I found some info about molding the bumper to the car(mx6.com), that's not what I would like to do.

Here's some pics so you can see what I'm talking about.









Also, what material can I put between the bumper and car to act as a buffer so the paint won't scratch off due to vibration, etc? I'm thinking of a type of tape, the kind that's used for seal a/c units. It's about 1/8" or 1/4" wide and paper thin, cut to any length you need.

Thank you.
Wayne

I've seen that kit before, the entire bumper is wavy and should be block
sanded. Darrelk has done quite a bit of work on fb so hopefully he'll
chime in soon.

As for not scraping paint, you can round off the sharp edges slightly..

Note:

Also, if you have aftermarket air intake kit on be very carefull driving
in the rain. The intake cone is located too low on the right hand side
and it can scoop water right into the engine.

Okay, first, go look here at some radical building and shaping of edges...
http://paintforum.net/phpBB2/viewtopic. ... 87&start=0
You can also see more of this build in Show and Tell here under Darrelk Fiberglass Kit Build.
So see, now what you need to do looks pretty easy, huh?
First, I'm not really seeing much filling you need to do. What you need to do is establish the dimension of your seam. Take a paint stir stick and wrap it with 80 grit sandpaper. When that stick passes through those gaps evenly you've then have your proper gap. A paint stir stick might seem kind of wide for a gap right now but remember you're goint to be adding primer, paint, clear, etc. You'd be surprised how much that can build up. Also try to "soften" or "radius" those edges slightly as Han said. You don't want sharp edges. Also I'm not wild about trying to cushion where glass meets glass. Best thing is try to support it from each side or thicken the fiberglass from the back so it cannot vibrate or come together. I've seen guys (yep, I and I'm one of them) try this, only to have the parts still just cut through that tape over time.
Han, also brought up another great point about that particular bumper. The sides of this car are arrow straight and make an already "wavy" bumper look pretty bad. Guide coat and block the crap out of that thing.

As for any gaps, I'd rough up the area to be filled with 80, build some Duraglass, shape it correctly, then add some finely chopped up mat in resin over and around the Duraglass. The idea is to fill out to a larger area to lock the Duraglass in. Then you can do a regular Bondo style filler or body icing over top of that.
And yes, I've seen guys just take a little Duraglass alone and build but in my opinion that's a little "time bomb" waiting to vibrate off.

Boy, does this car bring back memories. I had a 2001 Celica GTS 6 speed as a daily driver for a couple of years. Thought my clutch foot was going to fall off in traffic.

Hey, Han I got around that possible "hyrdolocking" of the aftermarket intake by using an inline vacuum breaker vlave in the intake tube. If the valve sensed a hydrolock situation it automatically opened up and burped in fresh air though itself. Those intakes are sooooo....low that scooping up a bunch of water is a definite possiblity.

Wayne, hope this helps.

Darrel, Han,
Thanks for the replies and link. I'll be going over it later. BTW Darrel, awesome looking car, what was the donor and is the whole thing fg?

Ok, the 'wavy' in the bumper is(i believe) actually poor coverage of paint and you can see the dark areas underneath. The bumper has already been sanded, bulldog'd, primered and sealed. Then I just took some white paint I had left over and sprayed a coat over it, just to see what it looked like white and on the car. Then I started working on getting the fit as close to right as I can and that's where I am now. The front bumper and side skirts are urethane, and will be painted at the same time as the rear bumper.
I see what you mean about using the paint stick, but what edges are you referring to soften/radius out? I know the area that meets the quarter panel needs to be fixed, and the wheel well area could be better shaped up.
As for the air intake, yes it's aftermarket, and yes it's just like you described, and yeah, it got hydrolocked in Feb '07. Got a new engine thru the insurance too. I ended up installing a sponge-thingie(i seriously forgot the name of it) on the tubing that's supposed to absorb the water and prevent it from locking again, but now I'll maybe end up changing to a different intake.

Thanks again

Wayne, I started with a 1986 Pontiac Fiero GT and yes, everything is fiberglass except for the top section around the sunroof which is the original sheet molded compound.

Han and I weren't picking on your particular bumper about the wavy thing, it's just that I think we have both seen this bumper on Celicas and it's almost always got waves in it right out of the mold. Sounds like you know what you're looking for as far as prep.

About softening the edges I just meant for you to make sure that the edges, at the bumper sides for example, slightly roll back from the seam.

Wow, you lucked out on the engine thing!

lucked out big time!

Post more pics of the progress.

Yeah. Got a new long block. We had to pay the deductible of $500, but the engine cost like $3k. What happen was that I drove through a puddle during a big downpour, as I have before many times, but this was through an area where the road was graded to the right and I was in the right lane and the drainage system was all backed-up and blocked with debris. Just before I hit the puddle I tried to change lanes, but was blocked in by a truck. I hit the puddle, we heard the bang, everything died out and we coasted in a McDonald's parking lot. The mechanic at the dealer told us that #2 piston rod snap and broke a hole into #3. On top of that, the insurance company also paid for the car rental for a month, another $1200. Took 2weeks just to find the engine.
Ok, about the bumper. I see what you guys are talking about, and I know/understand what needs to be done, it's just a matter of applying it. I already started sanding the wheel well area to roundout the edges there and give it a better, smoother shape. But a question came up, how can I add material to an area? In the pic of the pass. sideview, I may want to cut back some of the bumper at the wheel well, and add a new inner lip(mudflap) for added support, about an 90degree angle. And also add some towards the bottom part, to give it a more round shape as if the bumper is wrapping around the wheel. The space between the tire and the bumper is about an inch, and I did want to cut that back, but I didn't know how to fix afterwards, so I was just going to leave it like that.

Okay, adding more material is pretty much what I said earlier...

As for any gaps, I'd rough up the area to be filled with 80, build some Duraglass, shape it correctly, then add some finely chopped up mat in resin over and around the Duraglass. The idea is to fill out to a larger area to lock the Duraglass in. Then you can do a regular Bondo style filler or body icing over top of that.
And yes, I've seen guys just take a little Duraglass alone and build but in my opinion that's a little "time bomb" waiting to vibrate off.

You'll find Duraglass is much like using bondo but it gets much harder and can be smoothed to a nice rigid shape. Again, I think it is essential to go over it with chopped mat and glass to lock it in.

Curious...

How about masking off the quarter panels, roughing up the bumper
and apply the Duraglass between the gaps to get a flush fit to start with?

I think the typical bondo glass, bondo, putty will work just fine, providing its mounted correctly and your car never gets race cams

Ruff out both sides, tape off, draw a line, what ever you have to do to get your berrings on the measurement of space you need to fill, use it as a reference and build to it. Keep double checking the fitment of the bumper. Would suck for you to get where you want to be and you end up worse off then when you started.. Good luck