Body Kits

1) What about instructions and hardware? 99% of body kits and none of the aftermarket hoods sold come whatsoever with any hardware or instuctions. Only Bomex, Wings West, Xenon, and Kaminari come with any instructions and hardware for intallation. That is one reason you pay more for those brands. Kits come in the box raw. Most bumpers install like you would stock.

2) My bumper or side skirts is not going on. It seems too small, why? If you buy a full bumper either front or rear you must totally remove your stock OEM bumper cover. On many aftermarket bumpers such as 95-99 Eclipse and 96-00 Civics you will also need to remove the front reinforcement bar. You may need to remove factory OEM side skirts (aka rocker panels) before trying to install aftermarket side skirts.Believe or not we have had several people & body shops buy replacment bumpers and tried to install them over their stock OEM bumper.

• My bumper is not fitting correctly. It fits but there is some gaps. It does not fit like stock, why? - Different aero parts we sell come from many various different factories being mass produced. Also add the fact that these are coming from different molds some being 3rd and 4th generation copies and so on. This is why you pay $400-$600 for a cheap kit rather than $1,500-$4000+ range for original brand name kits. We cannot guarantee perfect fitments for the cheap kits. We can only guarantee perfect fitments with Wings West, Bomex, C-Westin', SWAAT, and other original brands. You will pay more for these which in our opinion is worth it since most people outside So. Calif. do not have access to the custom body shops we have here. We do try to send out the best and cleanest kits to all of our customers. For some kits there is only one mold that comes from one factory such as the Cyber Corolla kits, and some Kombat items we sell. The fitment is good, but the overall quality of the glass work is fair and may not be up to someone elses standards. You will have to deal with these kits when you purchase them and acknowledge this fact. We have lowered many aero kit prices to help in this situation as we know some additional prepping (sanding, grinding) will be involved.
  
• I received my bumper and there are small pit and / or pock marks and my bumper is not too smooth. Why is that? Again, read question 2b. Depending on the factory, some have less quality control than others. Depending on what the factories pays their labor force, if not much, the workers will do the minimum amount of grinding and sanding a bumper. Sometimes bumpers are pulled out of the mold too fast and they are soft in some areas. That is why you may see bondo marks on the bumper to smooth it out. It is very common (bondo marks) do not be alarmed. Sometimes during freight transit the bumper rubs and "hits" other parts in the box and small chips & pits can occur. Remember these are all fiberglass parts which are very, very fragile. You can make a damage claim which WILL delay your replacement part and waste more time. An easy common cure is to get some bondo from your local Home Depot or hardware store and you can dab a little on the area and fix it in about 5 minutes. Body shops can perform this minor easy repair, but we see shops outside Calif. charging ridiculous amounts for a couple minutes of labor and about $2 worth of materials used. Now available isBondo / Fiberglass combination which are even stronger and better than plain bondo. Cost is a little bit higher, but it works better and good to keep around if you accidentally crack your bumper later on down the line and can fix for almost nothing yourself rather than forking out a couple hundred for repair work.
  
• I received my bumper is there is a good size crack and / or other damage to the bumper. I do not want this bumper at all, what do I do? Please follow our claim procedure. Read our terms / conditions carefully located on the homepage of this website concerning claims. You must notify us immeadiately, meaning either the day you received the part. If not that day, then the following business day. If you have more questions; please feeel free to call or email us, we are more than happy to explain.
  
  
3) I do not want to remove my 5 mph crash bar, so can I still buy a bumper? Yes, but that is up to you if you want to modify the bumper or try to modify your front bar to accomadate your own request. Remember these parts are solely intended for racing purposes only and off highway use. Some bumpers do not require removal of the bar. We DO NOT know about every single vehicle application in which you may or may not remove the bar.

• Will my body shops remove the front reinforcement bar? Yes and No. Some will, and some will not because they do not want to be held liable and federal law requires it. Some may make you sign some sort of waiver. Some do not care and just want business. You will need to work that out with whatever body shop is installing your aero parts. Remember these parts are intended for race use only.
  
• Can I install these aero kits myself? Yes and No; some you can if you are mechanically inclined and have experience with this kind of labor. Some vehicles are much more difficult than others when removing and installing parts. You have to know your limitations and let the pro's handle the job if need be.
  
• What kind of body shop should I take the kit for installation? First off we do not intend to make anyone mad, but truth hurts. We do not recommend body shops that solely perform labor or identify themselves with crash & collision. We have found that many of them do not have the experience or "know how" when dealing with aftermarket body kits. The crash / collision do excellent work with fixing cars that get in accidents and they make them good as new in STOCK condition. There are some crash / collision shops out there that do deal with aftermarket kits and do great work at reasonable prices. We are only talking about those that do not. We have sent perfect form fitting kits to shops and for some magical reason they have never ever seen anything like this and with all their 50 year family lineage experience & wisdom passed down from generation to generation still cannot do the task. We do not care about that. Either they know how to work on modified cars with aftermarket kits or they do not. We have seen the local neighborhood kid who works in his garage down the street install kits without problem and do the work some of these body shops claim they have knowledge of performing without the headache of some body guy telling you he cannot install the kit or will not for some reason but want to still charge you storage fees, and some magical fee for looking at your car and determining he or she does not want to touch it.
  
• Wow! It sounds as if no one may be qualified to do the work. What do I do? Calm down. If you live in a major city or near one within reasonable driving distance you should easily find a custom body shop that does good work, has the experience, and has descent prices without getting raped. Sometimes you can go on internet forums concerning your car and ask people who are in your area who they recommend. Most people are willing and share good information and give you good leads. If you are the boondocks and have zero or maybe one or two local shops, then yes you have to possibly take a chance with them if you do not want to drive outside your area. We suggest to look around, investigate and get estimates first. Show the shop the kit first. Ask the shop manager or owner if he or she has experience with import body kits and how much experience do they have; meaning how many actual kits have they installed? Ask them which kits they have installed and painted. Ask to see pictures of the result of their work. Get an estimate in writing and signed. We have so many customers who drop the car off at the first body shop they see as soon as their car is in an accident and decide they now want a body kit because insurance will pay for it, so they get the cheapest kit possible to cut down on costs so they can buy other items. (We know the game.) They have no idea whatsoever what the experience level the shop has their car is at. All we are saying is do some homework and you will save yourself less hassle and probably some money in the future.
  
  
4) Are these parts legal for street use at all? Will I get in trouble? All we can go by is Calif. State Law where we work, drive, and reside. According to Calif. Vehicle Code you must have bumper covers (bumpers) and a hood on your vehicle at all times. It does not designate material. So fiberglass, carbon fiber, kevlar, etc. is okay. Every single state in USA has their own different vehicle code books and their own state highway laws. You can contact your local DMV or law enforcement for a copy of vehicle code state laws. In Calif. a code book is only $3.00 at any DMV. We suggest you get one.

5) If I buy a carbon fiber or fiberglass hood, how does it go on? Just like your stock one does. Almost all hoods we sell have latches and all hoods have pre-tapped holes for easy intallation. Hoods without latches such as 88-91 Civic / CRX, BMW's, Audi use the stock OEM latch which bolts right off of the stock metal hood in a matter of a couple minutes. For some cars (especially German cars) you will have to disengage the stock hydraulics. Takes a couple seconds to un-bolt them. You can use zip ties to hold them down.

• What about hood pins? Why do you recommend them? Because these aftermarket hoods are usually half the weight of your stock metal hood and lightweight intended for racing / track purposes. Most people buy these hoods for their daily drivers which is fine, but the hood pins are an extra safety measure to make sure the hood stays on the vehicle and not on someone elses windshield. We have heard of this happening. Do not be a victim! Do not risk getting sued! Spend an extra $20 bucks and get hood pins.
  
• Is it hard to install a hood? No, most are basic, remove some bolts, remove the hood, put on new aftermarket hood. Time frame is 5 minutes to 45 minutes depending on the car application. Usually you need a basic metric ratchet set and a flat head and phillips screwdrivers just in case.
  
• I purchased a Grade A hood and it looks like the carbon fiber weave is a little crooked in one or two places. I only notice it when I look very closely at the surface. Why is that? Is it a defect? Carbon Fiber is a fabric. Think of a T-Shirt like Hanes or Fruit of the Loom and see how it stretches when you pull on your shirt; well carbon fiber is the same thing. It stretches, therefore sometimes the weave may be slightly crooked or off in one or two places. 99% of the time you cannot tell unless you are closely scrutinizing the hood or looking for flaws with your nose almost touching the hood surface. If your plan is to heavily scrutinize the hood w/ a magnifying glass and this is a major nit-picking concern of yours, please DO NOT purchase a carbon fiber hood from us. We would rather keep it in stock then make a sale since obviously you are getting a hood for the wrong reasons. The hoods we sell are very, very clean and of the best quality factories. These hoods are intended to lighten the car for racing purposes and if the hood has vents to either let heat out or cool air come in depending on the vent or scoop function. Nothing more, nothing less. That is the sole purpose of these hoods. If you look at most race cars, yes most of the car is composed of carbon fiber, fiberglass, & kevlar, but you cannot tell because they paint everything and put graphics on the vehicle. Real race car drivers can care less about "Wow I can see the cool carbon fiber weave everywhere." We do however agree on a modified street car, yes un-painted carbon fiber looks cool and unique, this is just an explanation for the nit-pickers out there that are more concerned about indoor shows and thinking they are going to lose a point.