Yes indeed, very nice to have her back in the garage! But the more I look, the more shortcuts I find the bodyshop is cutting in preparation steps to save time and money... I'll have to update with a few choice pictures, but here is a major problem that they just couldn't solve on their own - this here battle tested front SE bumper.
And with that I mean a problem they couldn't solve without severly botching the job. I saw how they started repairing the rear bumper where the exhaust had melted away a small portion...
...and it was horrendous!
Basic method was simply piling on an entire tube of glue at once (35€ a pop) and hoping they could shape a proper form afterwards. The owner of the bodyshop admitted that he was not an expert when it comes to repairing accident damage and asked if there was any way I could get another bumper instead of forcing him to repair this one.
In my head I was screaming
A 30 year old original SE bodykit in Europe? SUUUUURRRE, I can source three of them brand new at any moment!!!!
About an hour after leaving the shop I couldn't bear the agony anymore, so I went back to save the front bumper and do the repairs myself.
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Here you can see the rips in the plastic I'm most worried about and on the left side there are some comparatively minor stress fractures, but still nothing that a proper approach can't permanently fix.
So I bought this here
plastic repair kit from 3M, which is an absolutely fantastic product!
You get these plastic patches that adhere to the backside and together with glueing the frontside, the system offers a very solid repair.
Afterwards you grind out the frontside, fill it with a flexible 2k glue and sand smooth.
So far so good. Stil need to fill in a few dimples and do a finish sanding, but it’s already looking fantastic and I finally have a good feeling about it.