Looking For A Better Quality Stock Style Black Rear Bumper.....??

My chrome rear bumper is rusting through and looks horrible. Not being a fan of chrome, I want to go with a black one. In searching, I found that the prices vary greatly, from about $170 to $260, with some that included the plastic trim, bolts, and brackets.

Any experiences or recommendations for a stock style rear bumper (that will fit with the tow hitch)?

I see that a number of them are E coated which I'm guessing that would have to be top coated. Am I correct?

 

The black stock rear on my 2010 only developed one rust spot about a nickel sized last year. Parked outside and been in Massachusetts all its life.

Recently some nice jerk in a Mercedes customized the side of the bumper and my rear quarter so I went with another stocker. Looks great and I want to say was about $150 or so, I'd have to ask my brother in law as his body shop did the work.

 

E-coating is hit or miss, mostly miss. It's like outsourcing manufacturing - there's nothing stopping a Made in China good from being good quality if that's what the outsourcer is willing to pay for, but often the optimization falls towards "as cheap as possible".

E-coating CAN be a fairly durable finish, but is most often cost optimized.

I would absolutely recommend giving it a good lick of paint over the e-coat, with the intention being the smooth, even e-coat will make a good base surface for an appropriate primer and paint, which will almost certainly be more durable against chips and nicks.

As an example, factory brake shields are e-coated which keeps them looking nice up until you start actually driving around with them, whereupon the e-coat gets blasted right off by the normal grit, pebbles, and debris that come from simply driving around. If you put a layer of POR-15 or your favorite industrial coating on them before installing, they will hold up for better and for far longer.

Even a scrupulously applied Rustoleum paint job will hold up pretty well on a bumper, and is easy to touch up if you ding it later. I did my tube bumper with a good degrease, prime, and multicoat of rattlecan and other than touching up high wear areas once every year or two, it still looks great despite winter conditions being a constant salt and grit power wash, and a lot of banging and bumping in the woods.

 

I plan to use Raptor Liner 1K on the e coated bumper. From the Raptor Liner website regarding e-coated parts ...."Clean the surface with wax and grease remover and scuff the surface with red / maroon scuff pad. Re-clean the surface before applying RAPTOR."

I'm going to contact them to verify this. I've used Raptor Liner before with their acid etch primer on bare steel and it worked great. They do have another primer but want to verify if it's needed or not needed.

 

Well. If you’re not putting a high clearance with tree savers and swingouts with 100 benefits

You can put any stock style used or new

or potentially drop it off somewhere to be coated
or even just pay to have it sandblasted and paint it

probably sold my old stock bumper for like 50 bucks after getting hit in the back
They’re not expensive

wouldn’t put too much money into stock tinfoil. Used you could find a truck that someone crashed into a wall.