2013 Tacoma DCSB Rear Bumper Bent? HOW!

The rear bumper on my Tacoma was bent over the holiday weekend out at Ocotillo Wells, CA. It never contacted any rocks or the ground yet an almost 3" gap is in front of the left side and 2 inches on the right. Toyota had no ideas and sent me to their body shop which says they too have no idea what caused it. They removed it, tweaked it a little but still looks bad. They looked for dings, or ground contact and found nothing. Nobody could have hit or damaged it in any way. After all the hitch would hit ground before anything else. They don't want to take responsibility for replacing it and I have to take it in again next week to have a district service manager for Toyota inspect it. I'll attach the pictures as well as a before. We used a small aluminum hitch rack on the way out there with a turkey and drinks in it, not wighing more than 100 lbs including the rack. Any ideas??? These pictures are after they tried to forced it back into shape, you can still see it doesn't look correct. The gap should be much smaller. There is no adjustment at all in these bumpers.

LINK TO IMAGES

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0BzV_OlRm8dnydWVxMXhsR1Jfdms&usp=sharing

 

I disagree, there is a ton of adjustment.

When I recently installed my hitch the bumper almost fell off, because the hitch shares several common bumper bracket bolts on the frame. In fact I had to leave the bumper loose and hanging a bit till I got the hitch all lined up and secured, then reposition the bumper and start tightening things up, tweaking as I went.

I did this laying in my driveway, by myself, and the gaps are perfect, bumper level side to side and a tiny pitch to the rear F-R wise.

I'll wager when your hitch was installed too much was left loose and it just moved.

But I'll also say that your dealer body shop is inept if they can't figure out how to adjust that (and nothing is bent as you say)

 

bills right i think goodluck and nice trk go ducks

 

Removed them all. Still couldn't get it close. It would move maybe ¼" in one direction. How could it be bent I guess is my main question. The body shop deals with these trucks all the time, since they work for Toyota mainly. I loosened all the bolts including removal of all plastics and loosened up all the bolts. This truck was made in Mexico if that means anything.

 

If you just look at the bumper hard enough it can bend. I wa surprised at how much you can flex it just by lightly pulling or pushing. It would not be hard to have a shopping cart or bike cause it to bend

 

Doesn't.