When I bought my Miata I knew the front end had a small accident.
Apparently the front bumper had a really E36 M3ty prep job before paint. The rocks on I-75 pop off paint daily
Suffice to say, the front end has looked better.
Best sources to find a bumper off a wrecked car? Thinks to think about when I do?
I'd probably get a quote to respray yours as well. Between the part and shipping it might come out to the same price. You really never know if the one you are getting has factory paint.
On car-part for front bumper covers, I usually have better luck looking under "Bumper Assy (Front) includes cover"
For the sellers "Bumper Assy" comes up alphabetically before "Bumper Cover" so I think that is why more get listed there.
For you and the Miata, unlike me and a Prius, you are searching for a part from generally a rare car. Certainly not sold in the same volume as a Prius. Adding to that, half of accidents that total cars are frontal accidents that kills the front bumper cover so then half the Miata in JYs have a mangled front bumper cover.
Car-part returns only this one white one in Houston:
Price not given but the others around the country are $500-$900. This cover is only slightly better than what you have. Repaint might be your answer.
In reply to John Welsh :
I looked at assemblies as well and found quite a few around me. They were in the $500 range, that's why I suggested a repaint might be the way to go here.
The ones I found the most are ones with halogen fogs, only one had LED fogs.
This might be a good place for this question...
Is there another website that is like car-part? A competitor?
I use car-part very often and I am lucky that the site seems popular in my part of Ohio/Michigan. But, it still surprises me how few actual JYs are on the site. Furthermore, there seem to be parts of the country where JYs don't use car-part. Do they use something similar?
It seems to me that the JYs pay either a monthly fee to car-part to list items. Or, they pay a per listing fee. Or, a combination of both. This seems ripe for a competitor. A good as car-part is, it could be so much better and compitition might be helpful for making it better.
In reply to John Welsh :
Car-part was actually started by a local-to-me junkyard, Foreign Auto Salvage, so it doesn't surprise me that it's a little more popular closer to its home base, as it were. I have no idea what their pricing structure looks like, but essentially they're selling an ERP solution to other yards and that will integrate to the website for listings.
One thing I have noticed, though, is that sometimes the same part gets listed by several different junkyards. FAS, for example, will tell you that they have the part "in a different warehouse" when they've listed something that actually is at a different yard and they're going to basically buy it from them, ship it in, and sell it to you.
John Welsh said:On car-part for front bumper covers, I usually have better luck looking under "Bumper Assy (Front) includes cover"
For the sellers "Bumper Assy" comes up alphabetically before "Bumper Cover" so I think that is why more get listed there.
For you and the Miata, unlike me and a Prius, you are searching for a part from generally a rare car. Certainly not sold in the same volume as a Prius. Adding to that, half of accidents that total cars are frontal accidents that kills the front bumper cover so then half the Miata in JYs have a mangled front bumper cover.
Car-part returns only this one white one in Houston:
Price not given but the others around the country are $500-$900. This cover is only slightly better than what you have. Repaint might be your answer.
Even worse than that, it isn't white its "Ceramic Metallic"
Guess I'll start getting quotes.
In reply to wae :
I have noticed the same part (and pictures) listed at various yards in various cities. I figured that the yards were co-owned but what you say of listing someone else's part makes sense.
In reply to Mr_Asa :
Yes, one thing I was going to comment is be sure you know your color options. I learned that Toyota Prius '04&'05 is a different silver than '06-'09. On the better car-part listing Prius they will provide a copy of the door jam vin plate which also gives color code.
In reply to wae :
Yeah it was difficult for me to pay $175 for a differential here in Michigan that is listed for $75 at its home junk yard in PA. In this case, they're either owned or affiliated together and there's a regular parts run among a number of them. Schram in mid-MI, and some yard in Schroyer PA or something.
And it's annoying when trying to get something in a hurry because so many yards list all these items they don't have on hand.
You'll need to log in to post.
