GaryL

I wanted to remove the dealer installed license plate bracket on the front bumper, because I thought it would look much better without it. I have a 430 with the AMG bumper. I took the car to the dealer body shop and was told that they could repair the holes, but the entire bumper would need to be repainted. The bumper had some minor stone chips, and a few tiny scrapres, so I figured these would be taken care of with the repaint.

Apparantly, the guy who wrote the order did not make it clear what was to be done, because they removed the bumper, repainted it, and put the bracket back on! They apologized, and offered to do the whole thing over at no charge.

Other than the inconvienence to me, is there any downside to repainting a part multiple times? At this point, I'm tempted to just say screw it, and ask for a price adjustment. The whole goal here,was to remove the bracket. Otherwise, there is no way I would have had this done.

Josh K

There's really no affect on the value of your car when bumpers are repainted. The only time your car's value goes down is when the metal parts (i.e. trunk, hood, fenders, body, doors) are repainted. If they're willing to do it for free, go for it and make sure they put you in a rental car for your inconvenience. ;0)

cgmike10

doesnt the license plate bracket attach to bumper moulding or the bumper itself. Anyway, repainting a bumper is expensive as paint is something like $60 a pint without hardner, activator, and clearcoat.

No bodyshop would do anything for free. Basically, I am sure they are going to tell you that they are doing it for free but they probably wont paint the whole bumper, tell you they did, in hope you will reccomend them to someone you know that will file an insurance claim with their shop.

Getting my amg bumper, (which I bought in almost 2 pieces, lol) on, repaired, and painted, cost me 550, and I got a good deal.

mmgrad

wow... $550 to repair & repaint??? adding in the cost of the actual bumper, wouldn't it come close to getting one directly from dealer which is already painted to match the factory paint?

cgmike10

I paid a whopping 30 bucks for the bumper from a junkyard. A bumper from the dealer costs 1800 and I dont think it comes painted....

mmgrad

in that case, GREAT JOB... can't wait to see some pics.

cgmike10

I will post pics shortly after all my mods i added this week are finished. Stay tuned for my "aluminum" dash kit.

P.S. The best deals are at junkyards. usually, after they sell a wrecked vehicle to a body shop for repair, they take off and sell items like rim, bumpers, interior items like radios..etc, because the bodyshop gets reimbursed for the labor from insurance company anyway so they would rather that the wrecked car come with the fewest possible items.

cgmike10

I dont mean to seem cheap, but i just dont have the heart to spend 1800+ on a bumper when my purchase for 580 will make it look just as good

GaryL

Just to clarify, they are not doing this for free. The bracket is attached to the bumper with either two or four screws. What I wanted them to do, is repair the holes once the bracket is taken off. To make it look perfect, the whole thing needs to be repainted once the repair has been done, rather than just touch up the area where the repair was made.

I got two quotes. If they use tape, and do the repaint without removing the bumper, it would be $260. If they remove the bumper and do the work, it would be about $400, because of the labor involved. They said removing the bumper to do the work was really the best way to go, so I agreed to the higher quote.

Because I had already had some stone chips in the bumper, I thought I could kill two birds with one stone---get the bracket removed, and get the stone chips taken care of at the same time.

If I didn't care about the bracket, I would not have paid $400 just to have a few stone chips removed---removing the bracket was really the main thing I wanted done. The problem, is they did not do this. They DID repaint the bumper, but did not repair the holes, and simply put the bracket back on. I still have to pay, but they offered to do the job over again, because they did not follow my instructions the first time.

cgmike10

sounds good to me. its too bad we get something like a 75 dollar ticket for not having a front license plate in NY. It takes away from the look of the car

GaryL

Yes, that bracket really does kind of ruin the appearance of the AMG designed bumper. I reside in Ohio, and technically front plates are required. However, I live almost right on the Ohio/Michigan border, and most of my driving is in Michigan, which does not require a front plate. I drove my previous car for three years without a front plate, and never had a problem. I once was pulled over for speeding in OH, but the cop never said a word about not having a front plate. I would say a good 20 to 30% of the cars I see in OH don't have a front plate, so they must not make a big deal about enforcing it.