rear bumper removal and refitting

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 5:29 pm

how much effort is involved in removing and refitting a facelift tourer rear bumper? and is there likely to be any problems?

only, i've removed my ugly towball and now have a mangled bumper left on there but i'm planning on being able to refit it all for the duration it's needed if i get a racecar/caravan/whatever else takes my fancy.

am i mad? or is it relatively easy to do?

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 8:44 pm

easy job mate, 5 mins to take it off. just two bolts. undo these and then pull bumper away from car, there are some large black clip things on each side, just be carefull not to brake em,

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 8:56 pm

are they on the inside of the back panel?

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:07 pm

The bolts are located on the underside of the bumper, going upwards, beware they are not always simple to get off, they tend to get more of the crud at the back of the car, it took me a good few hours to get the rear bumper off the back of my old sport, I had the biggest breaker bar ever, and it still wouldn't shift it, and I know a lot of other zoners have had this problem!!
When re-fitting, smear the threads with some copper grease.

BTW you will need a T55 Torq socket.

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:08 pm

hi mate, can you post a photo of your car with the anthracite alpinas?

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 11:14 pm

Simon wrote:The bolts are located on the underside of the bumper, going upwards, beware they are not always simple to get off, they tend to get more of the crud at the back of the car, it took me a good few hours to get the rear bumper off the back of my old sport, I had the biggest breaker bar ever, and it still wouldn't shift it, and I know a lot of other zoners have had this problem!!
When re-fitting, smear the threads with some copper grease.

BTW you will need a T55 Torq socket.

Or an allen key. 10mm iirc.

I have two Greg 318i and one had t55 front and rear and the other had 10mm allen... strange but true.

Post Wed Nov 02, 2005 11:28 pm

If the bolts are really rusted up, the captive nut can break away.
As an alternative, you can undo the four 13mm nuts which hold the bumper mounts in place.Three are behind the rear valence and one is in the boot. (Or possibly the other way around - too pi**ed to be sure!)

Post Thu Nov 03, 2005 8:11 pm

i reckon brians method may be best as in my experience exterior bumper bolts can be right little sods!

hopefully if i do it once it'll be easy to do again if i refit the towball.

here's a few pics. before with 17" and after with the nicer 16" ones... http://photobucket.com/albums/v382/gare ... ng/wheels/

fuzzy, what's the bodykit on yours? i've been undecided for ages about what to do with my bodywork. i reckon the sleeper effect is to nice to lose and am not keen on a m-tech'd tourer (loses the clean lines i reckon...). i was however tempted to colour code the bumper inserts and rubbing strips... but then again, it looks 'right' now i have the anthracite wheels on it.

opinions?