What is a Bumper Cover and Why is it Important on Your GM?
Every modern GM car has a front bumper cover and a rear bumper cover. A modern bumper cover is a lightweight version of the heavy steel bumpers you’d find on older cars.
A bumper cover has two parts: A flexible plastic cover and an impact bar (or reinforcement bar) that connects to the car frame. The main purpose of having bumper covers on your car is to have them absorb the impact of a minor collision.
The Difference Between Front and Rear Bumper Covers
While both front and rear bumpers serve the same purpose, they’re designed differently. That means these bumpers aren’t interchangeable. The design elements depend on the GMC year model, but generally:
- Front bumper covers are taller.
- Most GM rear bumper covers have sensors built in for detecting other objects if you back up too close to them. A few front bumpers have sensors too, but less common.
- Rear bumper covers come with lights for license plates while front bumpers don’t.
How a Bumper Cover Protects Your Vehicle
If there’s a minor blow to your car, the plastic cover will absorb it while leaving the impact bar intact. If the blow is more severe, the impact bar will absorb the impact (or most of it if the blow is bad enough). The bumper cover is designed to be easily replaceable at a relatively low cost.
How to Know Whether to Repair or Replace Your Broken Bumper Cover
When one of your bumper covers is damaged, you have two options: repair it or replace it. Which option is the right one, though?
It depends on the level of damage. In a nutshell, replacing your bumper cover is the far better option if:
- The bumper cover is cracked, which compromises its structural integrity.
- There are deep scratches on the bumper cover. While scratches don’t compromise the bumper cover’s structural integrity, they’re quite a pain to fix. You’d have to sand it down or fill in the scratches, and then repaint the bumper. It’s just easier to buy a brand new bumper cover.
- The tabs and clips are damaged or broken. When this happens, your bumper cover won’t be as secure as it should be and it may eventually fall off your car. It’s pretty much impossible to repair or replace these parts, so you’d have to buy a new bumper cover.
If your bumper cover doesn’t have any of the damages mentioned above, then you might be able to get away with just repairing the bumper cover.
Where to Find an OEM Replacement Bumper Cover at Wholesale Pricing
If you buy an OEM replacement bumper cover at a GM dealer, expect to pay a markup of about 30%. You’d be better off just ordering the exact same bumper cover online from a genuine OEM parts seller, like GM Parts Super Store.
It’s quite easy to find a front or rear bumper cover that fits your car perfectly. You just have to do a search on your car in our catalog. For your convenience, we’ve also included a list of our top selling bumper covers: