Help! *()#*^&%

[coachreed]

Damn me! Well, the unthinkable happened today... thought I could avoid this forever... but as my luck has been goin... well, NO SUCH LUCK!

I was leaving work today and what do you think I did? I backed into a freakin gaurd post! I have no idea what it was gaurding, but DAMN it was solid! I was watching my mirrors, just letting it idle out in reverse... saw a large gap and had JUST released my foot of the brake completely, just aobut to step on the gas... and WHAM! Just about bit my freakin tongue off! OUCH!

The damage seems to isolated to just the rear bumber wrap... nothing damaged on the door... it opens and closes just fine. The tail lights work and are without scratches. I also found out for sure that my bumper had been damaged before... there is a thin layer of some kind of putty on it... kinda blueish-green in color (putty-kote I think).

I want to completely replace my bumper wrap if it is feasible... might not be at this point... but want to check on it. Who do you recommend for new VX parts? I seem to recall something like St. Charles Isuzu or something like that being mentioned before. Anyone know who I'm talking about? Any other suggestions? What is this gonna set me back? Do I even want to know?

Thanks in advance. TTYL!

[Hotsauce]

Rear bumper skin shipped from st charles is like 230 or so. you may have som damage to the tubular bumper under that too.


John C.

[johnnyapollo]

I backed into some idiot trying to go around me while I was backing out of a parking space at an Orlando meet in Feb. Called up Merlin at St Charles and he had the rear bumper cover to me in 2 days. Hardest part are the two bolts on each side that are covered by the cladding on the rear quarter panels. I pried them up and used a Mag light to hold them off the cladding, then used a small socket with a torx bit taped inside to back out the bolts. Of course I had to make the cut for Tone's hitch, but that's pretty easy the second time. Wasn't too bad. I don't remember what the exact cost was (seems like the $230 that John mentions above is correct - shipping was free).

Depending on where you hit it, the tubular bumper supports could be dented or bent. You may need to have that straightened or rewelded. In all, you should still be able to do most if not all the work yourself. If it's real bad, you may want to get someone at a body shop to take a look (to make sure you didn't do any structural damage). However the VX is made really tough and I doubt if it's been made unsafe from backing into something.

-- John

[coachreed]

Wow! Thats not bad at all! I was expecting something like $400-$500! Well, I went out and looked at it again... I'm thinking that the impact felt harder than it really was because the fact that my headrests are out right now... sitting on the sewing table getting restitched for my Alpine TME-M760 headrest monitors. I think I have whiplash though! lol I will have to notch my bumper too as I have Tone's tow-package as well. Anyway, anyone have the number to St. Charles Isuzu? Any particular contact there to ask for? And, where is St. Charles Isuzu? St. Charles, MO? Thanks for the replies guys! I'll TTYL!

Randy

[coachreed]

Oh, ok... I found a link to St. Charles... just for anyone else with the needs... here it is...

St. Charles Isuzu (http://isuzu.stcharlesauto.com/)

... and yeah, I found that they are in the St. Louis area... St. Peters to be exact. Again, thanks for the replies guys. I'll report back later after I get'r fixed.

TTYL!

Coach!

[Tone]

Bummer - some people run the GoRhino step bar in their rear reciever thas will protect the rear in low speed events like this - runs about $80 and there is a link posted here on .info Take some pics when you get the rear cover off.

[EclipseGSX]

hey coachreed,


i checked isuzuparts.net for you:

89721 73030 rear bumper cover $234.92



if you damamged the support

89716 11813 rear support $238.91