Hey guys, Question here. I got in a very minor accident, someone backed up into the front of my Prius and caused a small dent but in a weird, hard to get to spot on the front bumper. I briefly tried using a hairdryer to see if I could just heat it and pop the dent out. But it’s in a weird spot and seems to be more difficult than I was hoping. And I’m not confident about taking the bumper off myself and trying that way. I reached out to a couple of repair places online to see if they could quickly do this and the feedback they gave was that the plastic is too damaged and that they would want to replace the whole bumper. I know that’s probably the longer term solution but honestly I barely drive anywhere(work from home) and I’ve been driving fine with the dent for a year now. I don’t care if there’s scratch cosmetically when the plastic is pushed out but I also am getting tired of just seeing that dent there. Any advice? Pics attached.
Monitor all the junk yards within a reasonable drive and soon as a white early Gen3 Prius shows up get down there right away and remove it and put it on your car for cheap... Alternatively, if you have more money to spend you can buy aftermarket front and rear ends that look much nicer than stock.
I would just have (the person who hit you) insurance company fix. It needs to be replaced with a new or used one. Good luck!
Or better yet get the check for repair from person's insurance and spend less than 1/10th of that on making it good as new DIY style!
What's the temperature in LA in January? You might just have to wait for it to warm up some. When I triggered my car's boulder detector, the month was July. I made plans to go out with a heat gun and try to straighten the plastic rocker panel, but by the next afternoon when I was getting ready to, just being parked in the sun had already done it. I never got a "before" pic, but you can imagine the rocker was all mashed in to match the door edge above it. Sun just popped it right back out. The door edge, now that was more work.
I concur. Due to where the dent is, you would have to replace the bumper. If possible, I would have the person and insurance get it done. Otherwise, you can remove the bumper yourself and poke it out. However, keep in mind that it really won't look any better than it does now. Just depends on what you want to do. Used bumpers can be found for cheap.
