Bumper Shaving Help

I've got a spare front GTI bumper and decided I'd like to shave the headlight washer caps and side markers. I haven't found a lot of info on how people typically do this on our cars. One of the few thread I've found is this one but it doesn't offer much insight.

I'm thinking I'll use SEM Plastic Bumper Repair Epoxy to fix the washer caps/side markers in place and then skim with SEM Bumper Bite Flexible Glaze.

I have no experience with plastic bumper body work so this is the best plan I could gather from my research on plastic welding, bumper epoxy, etc. Anyone have any experience and want to drop some knowledge?

I've also got a spare rear bumper kicking around but have no plans for it yet--any ideas?

Someone else's pic for attention:

usually a seal and bondo job. From there it's sand/prime/paint. Not much else to it. Just avoid side impacts, insurance will refuse payout if your ecodes are scrubbed.

FocalPoint said:

usually a seal and bondo job. From there it's sand/prime/paint. Not much else to it. Just avoid side impacts, insurance will refuse payout if your ecodes are scrubbed.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. Glad it's as straight forward as I assumed.

A few times on this forum I've seen it stated that insurance will refuse payout if side markers are shaved. Does anyone have actual experience with this happening?

Tony48 said:

Thanks for the info. Glad it's as straight forward as I assumed.

A few times on this forum I've seen it stated that insurance will refuse payout if side markers are shaved. Does anyone have actual experience with this happening?

Click to expand...

Had a friend with a MK4 Jetta with shaved ecodes, door handles, etc. Some dude ran a red and t-boned his front passenger side The claim was taken to arbitration as they wanted to challenge the signal timing at first, but since that's a fairly dry hole, they decided to dig deeper and pull photos of the car off the claimant's facebook page. In doing so, they discovered a whole mess of minor infractions they tried to throw at him, but the ones that stuck were the shaved ecodes which he couldn't prove were OEM, and conformed with regs. Arbitration ruled that the accident might've been avoided if OEM equipment was present, among other things, like cambered suspension, tint, etc. Claim was denied.

FocalPoint said:

Had a friend with a MK4 Jetta with shaved ecodes, door handles, etc. Some dude ran a red and t-boned his front passenger side The claim was taken to arbitration as they wanted to challenge the signal timing at first, but since that's a fairly dry hole, they decided to dig deeper and pull photos of the car off the claimant's facebook page. In doing so, they discovered a whole mess of minor infractions they tried to throw at him, but the ones that stuck were the shaved ecodes which he couldn't prove were OEM, and conformed with regs. Arbitration ruled that the accident might've been avoided if OEM equipment was present, among other things, like cambered suspension, tint, etc. Claim was denied.

Click to expand...

Yikes, that's definitely something to keep in mind. That being said I'm going to move forward with this project so I'd appreciate anyone with shaving experience to chime in. I'm mostly worried about any issues with cracking long term. at the side marker-bumper joint. Hoping the plastic-specific epoxy will keep that from happening.