kingman109

im rebuilding a 97 camaro with front end damage... the support beams that come out behind the impact absorber are bent...one pretty bad....rather than have frame shop straighten and reailign the whole headlight assembly beam too...i have a good deal on a new front clip for the car....

is it possible to just replace and if so how do i do it....what is involved?

thanx


pics of front end or on my website

z28chrizz

Did the nose on my buddies 94... didnt have to replace the radiator support so the nose on the car went together quickly, but it took a number of times to get things lined up. If the car needs to go on a frame straightener, none of the non crashed parts are going to fit easily. The tolerances for frame straighteners are pretty accurate these days. Without going on a straightner nothing will line up the way you want it to. Body work is more involved than most people think (if you do it right)

Good luck.

chesee48

its very easy with some pateince. I did mine and everythign went perfect. As long as u use a GM front piece, you should have no problem at all. good luck.

z28chrizz

After looking at the pics again all I can offer you is to tell you to try it. I have a feeling that the passenger side subframe is tweaked in towards the center of the car, as I think it was pulled in from the beam bending in. When you go to bolt on the new one, you will probably see it is too wide for the opening that is left. It also may have bent the strut tower, but that is hard to tell from the pics. My buddies car had a lot less apparent damage (his nose slid under another car so everything was deflected pretty evenly) and the shops around here wanted 5-6k to fix it. We were able to bend most of what we needed back with a slide hammer, a dent puller, a few sets of vice grips for the lighter stuff. The car still isnt 100% right, but it looks pretty straight for a couple of amateurs.

Worst thing that happens is that you try it and realize it is too far deflected to line up and you then have to take it to a frame shop.

MadKilla

I agree with the above post. That impact bar took a serious whack. I rebuilt mine after rear ending someone. My impact absorber was hit and the mounts were bent but nowhere near that much, just the bolt hole areas. Its possible that your subframe is out of whack. You should take it to have it checked to be sure.