Opinions on Recent Body Work

That truck crashed. It will never be 'factory new'. Button up the loose stuff and Move on. Sleep well.

 

I can except that to a point. However, besides the alignment and having a perfect gap. The way things were loose just did not seem right. I went to a local Toyota dealer that had some used Tacoma's on the lot and compared. The gaps on my truck (which is newer and lower mileage than anything they had) were worse than all their used Tacoma's. More importantly though.

There's parts missing on my truck!! Check the attached pics

(The pics are looking up from under the truck looking at the bottom side of the headlights)

The upper left and right bumper retainers, part numbers 52125B and 52126B were never re-installed. So that is why I can move my headlights (only the top two of the three bolts are securing the headlights) and is also part of the reason the bumper is not aligning right. My grill is also loose because they never clipped it in fully which is a less than a minute fix. And there's still the loose rivets on the reinforcement brackets that make it so I can move the bumper cover about a quarter inch. Sure, give me a bit of time I could tweak things and get the alignment better and even install the missing bumper retainers even drill out and put on some new rivets. But I shouldn't have to.

This just got ridiculous.

 

Sounds likey shoddy work that needs to be repoted to the insurance company

 

Will paint on textured bumpers "sink into" the texture as it cures?

So here I am months later and after taking my truck to that body shop about 4 times and getting it returned the last time after they had used a heat gun to get the bumper back up and painting a fender that had flaking paint which they had tried touching up initially. A week or two after they returned my truck I noticed the paint was beginning to flake off the bumper cover right where they had used the heat gun to correct warping in the bumper cover. So my insurance company gave me permission to take my truck to another shop.

I had already spoken with this second shop previously to get some second opinions. They work directly with the local Toyota dealer and I have gotten several good reviews and opinions on them from local parts stores. The second shop replaced the bumper cover and also the plastic filler which had been warped apparently by the excessive heat from the heat gun used to correct the warping in the bumper cover. The plastic filler looks fine. However the bumper cover is not what I was expecting. The finish doesn't match the rest of the flares. Check the attached pics. And even though I had stopped by the local Toyota dealer and seen a defect free bumper cover in person and told the second body shop it was there waiting for them I somehow ended up with a bit of warping again (disappointing but I could look past that).

The manager at the second shop claims the paint will sink into the texture as it cures. Has anyone else heard of this? And what's everyone's opinions on this finish. Ask for a redo? I consider it noticeable. Getting really sick of being a problem customer.

Here's the pics. The flares on the bumper have the correct textured appearance and the bumper has the glossy orange peel type of texture. The first picture shows a comparison of the two. The second shows just the flare and the third is the bumper cover.

http://cdn.vanillaforums.com/cartal...eUpload/57/d1b40104fb011fbf46d66a6227b4b8.jpg

http://cdn.vanillaforums.com/cartal...eUpload/93/fb68e2f88dcb9f13126aa654bc10e6.jpg

http://cdn.vanillaforums.com/cartal...eUpload/74/5f1746067d30b52d5573bfd4930972.jpg

 

have them fix the piece under the headlights to fender. Pass side touching and gap on drivers side one. Yeah the bumper should fit better than that if it was a reputable company.

 

Looks good to me. Hows the fit. Red is very difficult to match along with paint from another shop and factory paint. It looks good to me but im not seeing it in person. Glad the insurance company let you have the re-repair work completed.