Bumper upper rubber to hood seal replacement

[eli terry]

Has anyone ever had to replace the rubber in the upper track of the bumper? I had my bumper painted and told the auto body shop not to paint the rubber seal. Well they painted it anyhow and I just figured oh what the heck and put the bumper back onto my gen 3. Now the first really cold day I had the hood open checking fluids etc. When I closed the hood the painted vinyl strip shattered like glass. From what I could tell the paint changed the composition of the seal to an extremely brittle piece of plastic! What I am perplexed about is, does the entire bumper have to be replaced? Is it possible to remove all the pop rivets and remove the remainder of the seal and head to the junk yard for another seal removing it the same way? Should I hold the body shop liable? Here is another twist...they delivered the bumper to my house two weeks ago and have never sent me a bill. I offered to pay for the painting three times and was told they would call for my credit card number which they have failed to accomplish. My feeling is they are aware of the mistake because when they were doing the final buffing, it looks very suspicious on one corner of the seal, as though the metal strip was pried to re-insert the the seal. Any advice is appreciated. Thanks.

 

[NebraskaSHO]

I got a new one from Ford when my bumper was repainted in May. The other one was all bent up from the GF hitting a Continental. Drill out the old rivets, and place new SS ones in place.

 

[eli terry]

Already drilled out the rivets but having a hard time finding such large rivets to replace them with.

 

[NebraskaSHO]

Yeah IDK, talk to a body shop. I think they had some and installed it on my bumper.

I was 120 miles from the car when it got fixed. Also, it's not painted factory I think, and they painted this one black. It is peeling in several places, and should have never been painted.