DHC report nr. 75; Refitting rear bumper

When I fitted the rear bumper at the end of last year I found out that, while the left hand side aligned perfectly;

But the right hand side didn’t;

It’s clearly visible that this side was hanging down. This was caused by the fact that the bumpers’ RH mounting holes were placed slightly lower than the ones on the other side (Leylands tolerances ...). The lower edge of the bumper on the LH side was sitting snugly against the underside of the rear chassis beam. But on the RH side there was a gap of a few millimetres, so there should be room for some improvement. At the time (last day of the year) I couldn’t be bothered to refit it. I just made a mental note that I had to take it off in the not too far future, and see if I could get the alignment any better.

And this evening I gave it a try. With the bumper removed I enlarged the holes upwards a bit. With the correct tools (thx Rob) that only took a few minutes!

Looks a bit of a mess, as the grinding tool was rather efficient. But with a fair amount of wax-oil the tin worm will be kept at bay. With the holes enlarged the bumper could be refitted. Looks much better now with the top of the bumpers on both sides aligning pretty nicely with the top of the rear valances.

RH side is still not perfect but getting it any better means cutting away part of the lower lip of the mounting face on the chassis beam. Which I won’t as it is now much better as it left the factory.