Front Lip Refresh and Gauge Cluster Update

After a few years of use and a poor initial installation, the front lip on the car was in need of some serious help.  It wasn't mounted using the correct OEM brackets, and the paint was coming off.  So I sourced all six brackets from Toyota and got locking nuts and paint from the store.  I also imported a set of aluminum rings to go around the gauges in the instrument cluster as well as an LED set to replace the old incandescent bulbs behind the gauges.  They both really give it a more updated look.  Check out the big improvement for both the gauges and the front lip.




The installation for the trim rings and LEDs are done together as both require the removal of the instrument cluster.  Once out the remove the original twist and lock bulbs and replace them with the LEDs.  Very simple.  For the trim rings, you must also remove the plastic front cover and the black plastic trim.  Then its just a matter of placing the rings inside the holes of the black trim and then using a pencil to press the flaps around the backside.  Once you bend the flaps all the way around the rings, they are not going anywhere.  It is somewhat tedious because you must be careful not to cut yourself on the sharp aluminum flaps.  Once you're done here's what it looks like.

And now lit up at night with the new LEDs

As far as the lip goes, it was a labor intensive job of sanding down the old paint until I got to bare plastic follow by a few coats of Duplicolor OEM color paint and clear coat.  As I was sanding off the old paint, I found several layers of paint.  It seems that at some point this lip was painted black, white, and silver.  I believe the clear coat gave it a slight tint but its not as noticeable in person.  Once it dried I used the six OEM brackets shown here to bolt it up.  Using these brackets is a must for this lip.  It greatly reduces the sag of the bumper and keeps the lip tight to the bumper.












Here is what the front of the car looked like before and after my fix.

Big improvement! But I'm not quite finished yet.  To get it 100% I still need to install one more brace that sits on the underside of the top part of the bumper.  In these pictures from MR2NR15 on MR2OC.com, you can see how it mounts.

I'll post a picture after I can get this bumper bracket on so you can see how it reduces the sag.  Lastly is a full car shot with the repaired lip.  This is how the car looks today (March 2011).  Notice that I have previously removed the GReddy side skirts and put back the original side vents.