Carl's (in progress) Mk2 ST replica - rear bumper question

[Carlito_74]

Hi guys!

I have been keeping pretty quiet about my build and not really posted anything about it (might create a "my build" thread in the near future), after using useful advice and guides found on here by various members, my car is coming along really nicely. it's started out life as a 1.6 pre-facelift Ghia and will eventually look as good a possible ST replica as i can make it!

in b4 anyone says "it is waste of time & money creating a replica, and i may as well put the money used in to buying an actual ST" Yes! i wholeheartedly agree with you! and would love an ST however £5-8k or possibly plus i do not and will not have for a long time (whilst the cost of living is so high near London!) so i am quite happy turning my car looks wise into an ST as i love the design of the ST, However I will NOT be trying to make it out to look like something it's not by not branding it with ST badges here there and everywhere as i do not wish to embarrass myself at a red light or on the motorway next to an actual ST or RS or the boy racer Golf GTI's and all the other hot hatches lol.

So now that's out of the way, the following Mods i have done so far include:

• Xenon white LED interior
• ST rear spoiler
• ST rear bumper (purchased for a right steal on eBay! £68 delivered with both mounting brackets intact! )
• Aftermarket stereo
• Subwoofer installed
• fitted alternative heater control knobs

Mods to be done in the near future include (but not limited to):

• Dual exit Cat-back custom Stainless steel exhaust
• ST alloys
• ST front bumper
• ST side skirts
• Rear 3 windows tinted
• Either buy xenon headlights or fit HID's
• fit overlay Gel badges.
• De-badge rear and possibly fit ST badge on wings or replace with actual ST front wings.
• Fit Recaro interior seats Leather/cloth i don't mind too much.

So on to my question! i have fitted the ST rear bumper this weekend (before the heavens opened and the rain came down thankfully!) and all went well (except from having to snap off both bolts on my old bumper as the nuts had ceased as they tend to do on the mounting bracket) but it was damaged anyways and i had no intention of keeping it.

HOWEVER when it came to the two plastic screws on the underside of the bumper, the old mounting holes for these are situated at quite a distance away from the new ones? so my question is: how can i secure the bumper now from the underside? to stop it maybe flapping around at high speeds or anything like that.The bumper isn't falling off and is secure, but it is loose on the underside because of this. as you will see in my pictures, will an actual ST rear bumper reinforcement bar fix this? or is there anything else to be done that i'm missing?

if anybody else has had this problem when fitting an ST rear bumper themselves or if this is just how it is? OR if somebody with an actual ST could post a picture in this thread of what the underside of their's looks like so i can compare,please let me know!

any help and advice will be much appreciated!

i hope you like what I've achieved so far!

Carl

Problem as mentioned where you can see the screws and the mountings for these screws on the original bumper are in different positions

General Pics of the Car so far:

 

Before:

After (Much better!)

[Commencal24]

Maybe you'll have to fashion a bracket some how? 

May I suggest some wheel spacers too?

[Stoney871]

Some aluminium strips cut to size, drilled out and bolted in place should do the trick, as you say, the mounts are designed to stop the bumper pulling backwards with wind resistance and putting strain on the side brackets.

The ST bumper has shorter mounting tangs as it is designed to fit around a large centrally mounted exhaust box which sits where the non ST mounts are on your car.

[Carlito_74]

Thanks guys for your replies!

Commencal I've never really thought about putting spacers on the wheels? have you done this yourself and does it look good? it's definitely something i could look into, once i have found the right alloys! lol

Stoney thanks for your reply too! both of you had the same idea about coming up with a bracket of sorts to reach out to the fixing points and my thoughts were like you mentioned that they must of sat further back because of the rear boxes on the original ST's exhaust being there taking up more space.

Your idea makes a lot of sense, basically creating two strips to reach out from the original mounting points to the new ones if that's correct? and then fixing a nut and bolt from the bumper to the new strips for an even more secure fit?

[Commencal24]

I've done it on other cars not my focus as of yet. I'm sure there's somebody on here who's done but I can't think who.

 

[A-Ron]

looking good!, hope to get to do this soon on my own Focus, but am dying to change my standard Zetec Front bumper to an ST, im finding it close to impossible to source parts though. Any help on where to look constantly find myself on eBay looking at dodgy Fiberglass remakes from Bulgaria and the likes.keep it going thought enjoyed the read.

[Carlito_74]

Hi A-ron! apologies for the late response!

thanks for taking the time to read and i'm glad you enjoyed it! as i said i will eventually get around to making a proper build thread.. ("eventually" being the key word there! )

with regards to advice on parts, i also find myself trawling through eBay but its also handy to keep an eye on here on the buy/sell sections.. rare to come across a bumper as such but still worth keeping an eye on? also look on eBay for ST's that are being broken? sent out a few messages to various ones asking if they have what your looking for and sometime you can definitely gt lucky and they have what your after!

I find myself only looking for parts with the same colour code as myne to save the hassle of getting them re-sprayed, even though i do not know the going rate for a re-spray on a bumper these days but with myne being silver its once again rare to find as most ST's were orange,blue or black lol and not as many commonly found silver ones! haha

but yes keep your eyes out on eBay as they're like buses.. you wait for one to appear and then there's 2 or 3!.. lol before i got myne as cheap as i did, i almost bought a same bumper for £140 without the fog light sorrounds, but i waited a bit longer and then found myne with everything for £68!!  i'll take that bit of luck as i never get much!

[b4zz]

wow what a bargin for the st bumper fella fair play and look forward to seeing this evolve

[Carlito_74]

Thanks B4zz! i think i just had a lucky day! haha

i will get around to creating my build thread sometime very soon! as i already have the front bumper lined up and also the Dual exit custom exhaust, so much to be done and keep myself busy with!

Watch this space!