I recently repainted and installed a new header panel and bumper cover, due to crash damage.
I couldn't have the car down for more than a couple of hours, so I didn't refinish the grille, and I couldn't find one for a reasonable price that was in decent shape, to refinish and attach to the newly painted bumper.
I finally found a reasonable grille, it is (or...was) chrome off a base car, but like most of these and the headlight trim, the chrome is worn down to the plastic in the surround. The bars are all intact and chrome is in pretty good shape.
I like the LSC lack of chrome, but I think minimal chrome is fine. I have already replaced the door handles with chrome (as the design on them is 1000x better than the painted ones), and it has chrome around the windows.
I don't have great skills or time, but I am debating the following:
- prep and paint the surround on the base grille, painting surround body color (Silver Frost) and leaving the bars chrome
- prep and paint entire grille body color
- paint surround body color and bars black (probably not what I want with a Silver Frost car)
- get a plastic welding kit and fix my currently installed grille (a few bars are torn at the bottom, glued back in place, but one is loose, and the surround has a couple of accident damage spots and the paint is uneven)
- glue current grille and touch up damaged areas
- cut bars out and replace with mesh (Jag S type R style)
- some other replacement for the bars
I think I have seen some examples of alternately painted bars, but I can't seem to find them now.
This is where I currently am. I have sanded the clear with 2000 grit and polished the bumper and header panel so they now shine a lot more:
I couldn't have the car down for more than a couple of hours, so I didn't refinish the grille, and I couldn't find one for a reasonable price that was in decent shape, to refinish and attach to the newly painted bumper.
I finally found a reasonable grille, it is (or...was) chrome off a base car, but like most of these and the headlight trim, the chrome is worn down to the plastic in the surround. The bars are all intact and chrome is in pretty good shape.
I like the LSC lack of chrome, but I think minimal chrome is fine. I have already replaced the door handles with chrome (as the design on them is 1000x better than the painted ones), and it has chrome around the windows.
I don't have great skills or time, but I am debating the following:
- prep and paint the surround on the base grille, painting surround body color (Silver Frost) and leaving the bars chrome
- prep and paint entire grille body color
- paint surround body color and bars black (probably not what I want with a Silver Frost car)
- get a plastic welding kit and fix my currently installed grille (a few bars are torn at the bottom, glued back in place, but one is loose, and the surround has a couple of accident damage spots and the paint is uneven)
- glue current grille and touch up damaged areas
- cut bars out and replace with mesh (Jag S type R style)
- some other replacement for the bars
I think I have seen some examples of alternately painted bars, but I can't seem to find them now.
This is where I currently am. I have sanded the clear with 2000 grit and polished the bumper and header panel so they now shine a lot more:
