Replacing front crash bar and slam panel

[MK3 Menace]

Hi all,

Had a bit of a bump on Wednesday evening on the way to see Trog_NFS to sort out a intermittent ABS problem.

I ended up running into the back a 87 year old chap who emergency stopped about 200m from a roundabout as he felt the car in front was braking sharply which he wasn't. I almost got round him but clipped his rear quarter and bounced off (He was in a old Volvo).

I have lost a pass headlight, grill, front bumper and bonnet.

I have sourced a Vento front end really cheap, a new GTI bumper for £20 and I am going to a scrappy tomorrow get a new slam panel and crash bar.

The crash bar has been dented and moved back about 2-3 inches so want to replace it and the slam panel has cracked at the top and the bottom where the bumper took the brunt of the hit.

My question is, has anybody replaced a crash panel and slam panel before? What size tools do I need to remove and replace? Looks like a few different sizes hold the slam panel and not sure on the crash bar.

Any help gratefully received.

Ta,
Dan

[Gti_Jamo]

The entire front end comes off pretty easy once the bumper is off. Slam panel is bolted to the end of the chassis legs with 4 x 13mm bolts I think and the crash bar comes off with it. Then you have some 10mm bolts where it meet the front wings at the top. You'll also need to disconnect the radiator as that sits on the outside of the slam panel, sure it 4 x 8mm bolts and obviously you'll need some vice grips or something similar to disconnect the coolant hoses. Its all pretty obvious and straight forward once you get into it.

[thai-wronghorse]

I did mine a couple of weeks ago when sorting out my air-con. it's an absolute doddle to whip off.

[MK3 Menace]

Yep went and picked up the crash panel and slam panel today.

Easy to take off. Hardest part is removing it without disconnecting the air con rad and regular rad.

A lot of twisting later it's all done and back together.

New bumper, lights, grill and bonnet all fitted, lights and washers etc all working too. Long day but worth it.

Just need to sort ABS now...

[trog_nfs]

At least its not being written off mate.

Does this mean you still want to pop over to get it scan at some point?