The look of it came to me in a dream. You know, the kind where you wake up and immediately grab paper and pencil to start drawing (was this a scene in Close Encounters?). Here is what I did:
Cut stock urethane bumper with jig-saw to remove parts and reposition them. Mock up new features with cardboard and craft foam. WTF did I just do?
Sand stock bumper and drill a million tiny holes in it to promote adhesion of resin. Hot glue is used to hold craft foam in place. Foam is sanded to a smooth contour.
Wrap bumper with too many layers of fiberglass and polyurethane resin. I chose to sand after each layer, removing a third of my work each time. Cheap paper masks should be good enough.
My throat hurts, but let's add a couple layers of resin and with fibers.
Make sure everything still fits.
Sand essentially all of that resin/fiber filler back off to get a nice smooth surface.
Spend 4 weeks sick from sinus and lung infection. Determine that pussies probably live longer and buy a proper respirator to use when sanding. Coat bumper with the highest quality filler available at Advance Auto.
Sand everything smooth and apply a classy gray primer. Everything still fits.
Yup. That is how I imagined it. I put some flat black paint on it soon after. That was 3 or so years ago. I have scraped it a bunch of times on entrances and my wife backed into it. It developed a couple hairline cracks that I repaired and some that I haven't. I was going to use this one to build a mold for a full fiberglass one, but I think I am just done. My car needs a paint job and I can't risk it cracking after spending the money on real paint. I have decided to chuck it and slap a stock urethane bumper on there. If anyone wants to pick it up in Northern VA, they are welcome to. Maybe this will inspire someone to try or not to try a project like this.
