The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Bumper

Hey has anyone had problems mounting the front bumper, ie fitment. I have the 2 outside bolts in but the the 2 inside ones are about 1/4 to 1/2 inch off! Let me know Thanks Ryan

Most of those old trucks have been popped in the front bumper a few times. Off by 1/4" to 1/2" isn't much, it's possible your brkts are bent? You can bend the brkts a little, but make sure bumper and brkts fit flush so you don't pop off the chrome or paint around the bolt holes when you tighten them up.

I wonder if it might be easier to mount an obstreperous bumper if you bolted it up to the brackets first then to the frame.

I forgot to add that I just got the brackets from LMC so I really hope they are not bent. Big Chevy 3600 I am ready to try anything at this point, I will let you know how it turns out and thanks Yakimabowtie I keep that in mind I would hate to mess up the bumper its about the best looking thing on the truck right now! Thanks Ryan

Hi Ryan, I just fit up a rear bumper and brackets that came from Chevy Duty. They came with the truck when I bought it. The PO bought the parts but never installed them because he said the brackets didn't fit. True, they were off by quite a bit. Once they were mounted to the frame I used a big old crescent wrench as a lever and simply bent it around to match the holes. It’s amazing how easily the brackets can be bent. One thing you might want to do before installing the brackets is to round off the edges to make them look more like the original bracket material.
Once the holes were lined up with the bumper I bent the last couple of inches by heating the bracket till it matched the general curvature of the bumper as close as possible. It’s impossible to get the contact area perfectly flush or to match the compound curvature of the bumper. What you want is more or less a 2” square pad that contacts the bumper.
Like our member from Yakima noted, chrome plating won’t bend very much so you don’t want to synch up the bumper to tightly or it will pop the plating. I installed a thick layer of gasket material between the bracket and bumper. They used this in mounting the parts of the front clip or running boards and called them anti-squeak gaskets.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Denny about sums it up. Aftermarket/reproduction parts for the most part are a little off at best most of the time. A little bending and maybe even reeming the holes a little bit to make them fit won't hurt anything. You can X measure the frame to see if it is off, but most likely a modification of the bracket will be necessary.

Does that mean it might be best to replace the old bumper with a stainless bumper instead of chrome? It would take more distortion.

There is no problem with the chrome bumpers Big. We're just saying not to crank it up till you bend the bumper. I've heard this from several old body men also and it makes perfect sense if you've ever pealed old chrome off a bent bumper.
This is a personal preferance, but I don/t really like the color you get from SS. The chrome is much brighter than the SS much like you get from the clear coats with todays paint. The polished SS to me looks like, well, polished SS.
Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Wow thanks Denny! I tried Big Chevy's idea of putting the brackets on the bumper first and they fit! But when I went to put it on the truck I could not get it wide enough to go over the rivets in the frame. So I think that I will try your idea of rounding off the edges and I just happen to have a nice big old crescent wrench I can use to bend them into submition! Thanks guys for all the help I will let you know how it turns out. Thanks Ryan