Changing "Panel Grill Lower"


Thread Starter #1
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I decided to replace the bar under the panel grille. It was not looking good after a minor accident few years back. And it was very rusty near the screw holes of it. So I started searching for the part. It was not easy because my car is a older model (97 one). The only part I manged to find was from the authorized dealer in Sri Lanka but it too needed some adjustments before fitting to the car. Then me & my brother started the difficult part of the job.

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The old one and the new one. You clearly see the difference.

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Then we started cutting and bending the new bar to fit the existing setup.

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The cut was welded together preserving the shape. We took the part to nearby garage to get it welded.

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When we tray the new bar we noticed that the "Member Front Center" part is not aligning with it. This was probably due to the accident. There was no time to go and look for that part so we created one out of sheet metal with a little help of our welding guy at the garage.

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The old parts and the new ones. We used Epoxy Iron Oxide primer and white paint for both parts. They look nice now. [:)]

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We fitted the new parts to the car. They look good on her.

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Finished. [:D]
 
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Wow looks neat now, I guess these frame is common for all models. It costs around 150rs in India.

BTW why did you cut it in the ends ?

Did you retro fit the A/C ? I can see 134a Gas condenser ..
 
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Thats a neat job buddy. In fact the whole front end is really well maintained. Also the sticker on the indicators. I feel the chassy (behind the headlamp) is a bit different to what we have hear. Isn't it Varun?
 
Thread Starter #5
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wonderful job man.looks so neat and clean [clap]
Thank you. [:)]

Wow looks neat now, I guess these frame is common for all models. It costs around 150rs in India.

BTW why did you cut it in the ends ?

Did you retro fit the A/C ? I can see 134a Gas condenser ..
Varun, it was not in our case. Actually what we got was longer than the one we had in the car. So had to modify it to fit the car. And it costed around 1100 LKR.

And yes we did rebuild the whole A/C system. When we bought this car it didn't have A/C. We fitted an aftermarket one at that time. Two years back we rebuilt the whole system (Every part was replaced in the system) to use the new gas.

Thats a neat job buddy. In fact the whole front end is really well maintained. Also the sticker on the indicators. I feel the chassy (behind the headlamp) is a bit different to what we have hear. Isn't it Varun?
Thank you. [:)]
 
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