The bumper on my 2002 Sport Edition (Thundercloud Silver Metalic) has large portions of paint gone. It looks like it had chipped and when the previous owner washed it the paint flaked off. I've read here and other forums somewhere that the metallic paint seems to have adhesion problems.
My question is, is there a way to retouch this myself and have it look decent and not flake off again or take more paint off with it? Or do I need to take it in and have the bumper pulled off, and stripped, and repainted with special adhesion additive stuff/primer coat? I don't care if it looks perfect, just so long as it doesn't look horrible. I'm planning on getting a grill guard eventually anyway. It won't cover up the spot where the paint is gone but will hopefully at least draw attention away from it.
My question is, is there a way to retouch this myself and have it look decent and not flake off again or take more paint off with it? Or do I need to take it in and have the bumper pulled off, and stripped, and repainted with special adhesion additive stuff/primer coat? I don't care if it looks perfect, just so long as it doesn't look horrible. I'm planning on getting a grill guard eventually anyway. It won't cover up the spot where the paint is gone but will hopefully at least draw attention away from it.
The guy I talked to when I had a prepurchase inspection (and again this week when I had it in for 90k service) said that at the autobody place he used to work they saw a lot of 2000-2002 Toyotas with paint adhesion problems on the bumper. I don't know how trustworthy he is though. I don't think they tensioned things properly when they replaced my timing belt as it squeals really badly and I want to take it back to them and see what they can do.