Hello all,

The front bumber on my 1973 delta 88 is not the same distance from the front of the car on the left and the right sides. Basically the bumber is closer to the car on the driver side than it is on the passenger side. I'm guessing the previous owner must have bumped a wall or something when parking it, because there is no other noticable damage. My question is how do I fix this? I think my year delta had 5 mph impact bumpers and bumper shock absorbers on them, so do you think that the driver side shock absorber just didn't pop back out after the bump? I'm wondering if it is possible to just pull this side of the bumper back out, or do something else that would not require a body shop to accomplish.

thanks,
Chris

 

I think the 1973 B Bodies have spring braces behind the bumper to absorb energy just like the 72.s do. You're probably right, it was hit at slow speed on the right side. You're going to have to take off the bumper and fix the bend any bent spring braces back to original. Chances are you can use the left side as a model of what it needs to be. If you have a chassis service manual look in the bumpers section. For 1972 B Bodies its page 14-2. If you need a picture to go on, I can scan it and send it to your email. LMK.

Easy enough to check, slide under the front of the car and make some comparisons from left to right. If it's collapsed quite a bit, you'll see the problem right away.

 

Actually 1973 was the first year for the hydraulic bumper shocks on the front (1974 for the back). You are correct in assuming that the previous owner likely ran into something. You can try to pull the shock out, but you may need to replace it.

 

Try bumping the other side into something very lightly. Sometimes that's enough to spring a cocked bumper shock back into plumb.

Sometimes a tap with a bigass hammer will accomplish it, if you can get back there to do it. 73 has all that fiberglass header panel behind there.

 

Thanks Joe,
Couldn't remember that off hand. Would it matter how long the bumper has been in this state? Curious to know if it will "pop back" into position. I always thought that if a bumper shock got damaged in a collision that you'd have to replace it, because the energy was absorbed into the shock like it was designed and protected the skin of the car. If it's really old damage, my guess would be that it won't reset. If it was going to do that, it would have done it a long time ago. The description of only one side bent suggests that the shock tube may be bent and is preventing the bumper from restoring to its original position. This sound right to you?

 

I'm not an expert on the hydraulic bumper shocks. I remember the ads when the cars were new showing the bumper coming back to it's original position. If these units were gas charged (and I believe they were) the gas may have leaked out over the years.

 

Thanks all. I will climb underneath in the next couple of nights and see if I can "bump" it back into alignment. If that fails I will probably replace the shock as Joe suggested. Hope they aren't as hard to find as most every other part for this car is!