Packard Forum Index » Post-War (1946-54)

I was able to remove one bumper, but now I can't get the screws with nut on bottom out of the other three. Soaked in P Blaster, but can't hold the screw end with a screwdriver. Any suggestions ?

I am thinking about trying an impact screwdriver on my 48 hood bumpers, with a wrench on the bottom nut. Or am I going to have to drill them out ? Thanks

I'd try the impact driver but if the head or slot is totally gone expect you will have to drill or cold chisel the screws off from the bottom. If the screws are really rusted and there is enough bite for the impact driver, the head may just twist off when you hit the driver.

They are in really good shape- I removed one that had only one screw for some reason, and have been trying one other, which is getting rounded off , Haven't tried the other two yet .

HH 56 - Were you able to recondition the rubber on your hood bumpers ? I have the ones on my 48 off now, and would like to reuse them, if I can replace the rubber coating. What did you use ? ( I know the 48 bumpers are a little different). Thanks

What I did was cast completely new pieces. Filled all the cracks and breaks on the old pieces with body filler to make them look mostly in new condition and then made silicone molds. Cut new metal cores and then poured urethane rubber around the new cores so they became a complete piece. My 47s are different than your 48s so my molds would not work for yours. I didn't realize Max had the 47 pieces at the time so I made mine but since yours are in repro don't think with the price of urethane rubber it is cost effective to make them the way I did.

With a cost of nearly $80 for four repos ( I think they are 17.00 each ) - I will try to cover them in rubber if possible. The cores are still good.

I know there is a dipping product called plasticoat in hardware stores that does a job of coating but thought that might be too shiny. I bought a can of "synthetic liquid rubber" from McMaster and was going to try the re-coating on mine. I never did try so don't know how it looks or if it will hold up. The small can was cheaper than the dip out here. If your rubber has cracks it might cover them but not sure how it would do on missing chunks without some extra filling.http://www.mcmaster.com/#76425a51/=tv7cpk

Do you know how thick the rubber is on the top and bottom of an original bumper ?

I don't have a 48 piece to look at but on the 47 the metal is on the bottom next to fender with just a thin skin of rubber covering it -- so maybe about as thick as a piece of paper on that side. The top side is about 1/8" thick over the metal for a total thickness of about .200 on the flat portion. The screw hole recess on the top goes to the metal. 47 has the approx 5/16" diameter rounded portion on the side and metal comes up to sort of an inverted V shape inside that rounded portion. The metal is probably surrounded by the same 1/8" of rubber.

Looking at a drawing of Steele's wedge repro I imagine the 48 piece would be around those dimensions with the metal just flat on the bottom side and bent up at an angle for the wedge.

Attach file:

---

  (9.34 KB)


  (16.74 KB)