[carve]

My local paint shop wanted $350 to remove and install my bumper. DIY's usually take me 2x as long as suggested, but this is super-easy. It took me less than 15 minutes to remove the bumper (including taking pictures), and another 12 to remove to remove the lights and grilles from it.

Tools Needed
1 nut driver with interchangeable bits
1 8 mm socket for nut driver
1 T30 Torx bit for nut driver

0) (optional) I chose to begin by using a floor jack on the central jacking point to lift the front wheels off the ground. This gives a little more room in the wheels wells, and lets you move the front wheels left and right without having to get in the car and crank the wheel.

1) Open the hood. Remove the 4 T30 Torx bolts from the top edge of the bumper (Two of which are visible in pic 1, on either side of the hood catch

2) Remove the two 8 mm bolts in each fender liner (pics 2 & 3). There's an optional 3rd bolt on the top of the fender (pic 4) that I removed, which might've made the next step slightly easier (apologies, but for some reason my vertically oriented pictures uploaded sideways. Look at the trees in the background to identify which way is up. If you can't see trees, I think left is up on all the confusing pics.

3) Peel back the fender liner, and look up to the area where the bumper meets the fender (pic 5). There are two bolts up there on each side. Undo these bolts (pic 6). These bolts attach the plastic bumper to the steel fender (pic 7)

4) Remove your headlight washer covers, if applicable. Get a fingernail under 'em and pull them forward (pic 8). Then grab the black plastic nozzle tube and unclip the cover from the pins it rests on (pic 9)

5) Unfasten the six 8 mm bolts under the bumper (pic 10)

6) Go back to the wheel wells and pull each side of the bumper forward a bit. Reach in an unclip the fog light cable by pinching it's back edge and pulling back (pic 11). They come off fairly easy.

7) The bumper should be practically falling off at this point. Pull it forward, and set it down (pic 12). Enjoy.

[Firefly6]

This great - I have to replace a headlamp washer that got broken in a botched theft. This will save me $600.

[tracerit]

wow, looks like an easy to do job. thakns for the pictures and guide! curious where you lifted your car in the middle with that last picture though.

[carve]

There's a little piece of metal sticking through the belly pan. It has a hole in it. It's safe to jack there. Just try to make sure the jack is centered, otherwise you'll dent it. You may need to pull your front wheels onto some 2x4's to get the front end high enough to put the jack under it.

[BreakPoint]

My local shop wanted 300 to remove and install new bumper. This awesome DIY writeup guided me through a 20min removal. Thanks!

[klove83]

Thank You

[Sippe]

Originally Posted by Firefly6

This great - I have to replace a headlamp washer that got broken in a botched theft. This will save me $600.

Was it difficult to replace the headlight washers (the telescopic nozzles)? I mean it seems quite easy once the front bumper is off, or am I wrong?

[everlast]

FWIW, I just did this and found it much easier to remove the front inner fender liners. It's about 6 8mm bolts and the one 10mm plastic nut at the bottom near the bottom of the strut.

I'd rather take out a few more bolts and get full complete easy access to the upper bumper bolts and the foglights than stress the plastic of the fender liner and scrape my hands.

Also, this car was an LCI and there were a couple subtle differences: there are 7 bolts on the bottom of the bumper, not 6, and there are clips holding the wiring for the foglights to the back of the light assembly which just pull off. Everything else was the same.

Great write up, btw.

[vilord]

And to bring a thread back from the dead for no particularly good reason...


I went through this tutorial on my '07 e91 wagon, and it was spot on, on all counts.

Thank you for a great writeup, my bumper is now securely attached again, despite the super-tall end-of-parking-space-concrete-thing that scratched up and damaged the bottom of it.
Cheers!

[StateTrooper9258]

anyone have any suggestions on how to take the screw holes out of the front bumper of my 325? I want to make my own rigged frame for my plate to stick underneath the front grill instead of having to drill it into the bumper itself. Thanks