Sleazy front bumper appliqué

Two things in life are inevitable: taxes, and dinging up a new car

 

Yeah mine has a few chips/cracks too. I believe its made of acrylic. It would be more expensive, but probably help if Toyota made it from polycarbonate in the future.

 

It's cost cutting, and car paint seems thinner for the same reason.

 

Painted plastic fairings replaced proper bumpers in the early eighties. Progress...

 

Is it even fair to call them bumpers anymore. They are more like dent attractors.

 

True.
Today's bumpers are more like Insurance Deductible Reachers...that is the slightest damage is likely to reach your deductible.
They are designed to absorb force in an impact...but they aren't designed to survive that impact.

 

If I had to bet, I'd bet that they are designed that way specifically to "encourage" (require?) the use of paint protection films.

 

They are "bumper covers" not bumpers. The bumper is underneath the cover.
-Any- plastic of -any- kind will suffer damage from rocks on the front of a car. -Any- painted surface will also suffer damage.
It's a fact of life. Live with it. Even the 3M film can be damaged (mine has a hole in it from a larger rock, which also dented the aluminum hood).

Your car is not and could not be designed to last forever. It will suffer minor damage from use, which will eventually end its' life as the damage builds. Nothing stays new forever.

 

So tonight on my way home a stone kicked up from a vehicle in front of me and literally put a hole in the acrylic. Its probably 5/16" diameter. To make it get even more attention, it cracked in a few places which just leads your eyes to the hole. I'll get some pics or maybe post a video about it tomorrow.

 

Hah: Jeep Wrangler didn't get the memo. I'm just waiting on the day they hybridize that rolling garden shed, lol.

 

You speak the truth.
But I'm remembering the 50's. 60's. and 70's when automobiles had bumpers that took entire mountain sides of metal to produce.
You could encounter some significant damage producing impacts with those old bumpers....pop the dents out...and the car was unharmed. What we call "bumpers" today? Aren't really even designed to withstand a "bump".

Yeah the cars are safer. It's better. But it's a difference.

 

I'm thinking of those Lexus front "grills"..., like driving around with your teeth hanging out.



Versus, say Jeep Wrangler:

 

I see the Jeep fixation continues .

While you don't appreciate the Lexus front grill, it grows on you after awhile. There are some more refined grills other than the F Sport grill you linked above:



But then again, I look at it daily, so that might be why.

 

As mentioned, here is the crack in my front bumper. Really wish Toyota would address this in the future.

 

The bumper cover isn't weak enough for a stone to do that at any speed you can travel at. That's a pellet gun or 22 cal. bullet hole. Or you drove up against a "pointy" object.

 

I can assure you that I didn't shoot my car or drive up against a pointy object. I do a lot of highway driving though, so I'm quite certain it was from a rock or debris that kicked up from a vehicle. The other day on the interstate I recall hearing a rock hit what I thought was my windshield. It was pretty loud and I feared that I would have to replace my windshield. When time went on and no cracks formed, I figured I was lucky, but now I'm thinking that it must have been my bumper that got hit.