My wife just dinged the GX. "Hit the gas instead of the brake" I know,,,, how could anyone do that????????????? Anyway, she is a horrible driver, but extremely careful and doesn't exceed her capabilities. But of course I can't show her how to drive. Her Dad was at least as bad, so runs in the family, I guess. So in a parking lot, parking the car. She hit the gas instead of the brake. Ran over the curb (no big deal there) but there was a metal safety fence prior to a large drainage culvert. She took out the fence. Pretty much destroyed the front plastic facia of the car. The cop that showed up was pretty cool. Told her, "my Jeep can just drive out of there, so I'm sure your luxury 4 runner can as well. " Low range,and back out. No problem. So we have a city owned railing to pay for, and what to do about fixing the GX? New ugly plastic facia, or winch bumper????? Or????? Really sucks, we have lots going on right now, don't need this.

My guess is that replacing the front bumper with original will cost at least as much as a winch bumper, or very close, so if that was in your plans now is the time to do it.

I havn't figured it all out yet. Yes i would prefer to put something decent on it. What Lexus puts on it is ugly at best and non functional, in the way at worst. I'm still trying to come to grips on how she could have done this. Some of the plastic is cheaper than I would have thought. So far none of the electronics seem effected. So that is good.

I have way too much on my plate right now to deal with this. I spent a couple hours today putting the plastic back together so its drivable. Checking prices, just eh air dam is close to $400. It's toast, many of the attachment points are broken. I can make it work, nobody would notice. But its certainly not right. The hidious bumper cover is anywhere from $400 to $1000. Then the turn signal is probably $50 or more. then incidentals. So trying to figure out what to do with it. I actually want to put something decent on it. But most of what I see doesn't fix some of the problems. The bumper cover is damaged. Usable, but damaged. And the after market bumpers don;t really address the upper part of the bumper cover that is damaged. Seems like a good time to fix Toyota's screw up with the overhang. But just how?

Sounds like a good excuse to slap a steel bumper on there to me.....get the rest from a salvage yard.

Doing some additional learning. This car is not easy to drive in heavy traffic. The throttle response is horrible, and I have noticed that when the AC compressor engages, the RPM goes up over 200 RPM. So if that happens when trying to stop, its like adding gas while stopping. Combine that with the poor throttle response. So as she started to pull in to the parking spot. It's a slight hill. Hit the gas nothing happens (throttle response) so she applies more throttle, the AC compressor kicks in at the same time, the throttle catches up tto application, and all combined, and the car lurches forward, instead of smoothly going forward. I think she also panicked and didn't get on the brakes in time. The poor brake response didn't help much either. Just more reasons to have trouble warming up to this car.