Carbon Fiber Bumper Exhaust Surround, Renewal

So if you've seen pictures of the rear bumper of my car, I've had this thin dry carbon fiber exhaust surround I found on Yahoo Auctions back in 2008!

With the newly installed Tomei ExPreme Exhaust

Obviously, the goal here is to protect the bumper from all the soot the RB26 engine spews out.

Long-time readers know that my car was used as the jig to develop the exhaust, and that this shot   was used for their catalog

While it still looks great from a distance, I was becoming aware that the heat of the exhaust, as well as it's location on the rear edge of the bumper, was wreaking havoc on the carbon.

A close-up reveals these flaws.

But that's ok... it's much easier to remove and replace this piece, than to have the bumper touched up. In fact, I took the piece off before I had my car detailed, so that all the surrounding areas (and underneath) could be properly cleaned and protected.

 I then went back to find the vendor on Yahoo Auctions, 5000 yen and 3 days later:

Old one obviously the one not wrapped up.

Here you can compare directly. Camera angle shot makes old one on left look larger.

As you can see this carbon is really thin, but since it's not bolted on, replacement is an easy affair. Just take off the old one, clean the bumper (I had taken it off before the detail at RAPT), then simply slap back on using the double stick tape.

You can see the remnants of the tape on the old one on top.

Like this:

Truth be told the tape is old and I may need to readjust later

Make sure the area around the exhaust is clean:

A quick wipe with a microfiber towel, then

Peel off the backing of the double stick tape, then slap on making sure one edge slips between the bumper and the spat:

Easy!

Later, after a quick drive:

Can't even tell it's been replaced.

Oh, and I dropped into Nissan to order some minor bits so I will have another update on this blog soon!... stay tuned and thanks for reading!