Repair Or Replace Bullbar and dodgy repairers

Gday Kiwi,
A big problem these days is over certification.....If the bull bar is repaired and brought back to its original condition with no modifications, it will still be certified as it always was.
If you want them to give you some sort of letter of garuntee with it, Im sure they will ablige by haveing an engineer look at it, who will probably and ask the bloke who repaired it what he thinks.......and then charge you a small fortune.
Id wait till the repair was done and see if it was done properly first.

Sorry...had a bad day with engineers, Australian standards, worksafe and company policies.......Hahahaha

Good point Kiwi,
The repairer dropped the car at steel fabrication shop and said he had "had a few bars done there before"
I don't understand how this would be okay for a part of the vehicle that works in conjunction with a safety aspect of the vehicle.

I expressed your same thoughts to the insurers assessor and he decided on the spot to go and see the damage himself and was surprised to find it hadn't even gone to the panel shop but straight to a fabricator.

Oh and Hairy,

I ain't paying a cent, that's what insurance is for. (my annual premium every year for bugger all in return)

Hi Hairy,

Some bars are not certified for use on air bag equipped vehicles. If you fit a non-certified bar then you are interfering with the manufacturers (certified) safety mechanisms. Bit like fitting spacers behind wheel rims - a big no no. The air bag MUST operate under certain conditions and fitting a bar MAY inter fear with that operation. If you strengthen the bar some way by adding welds, gussets or dbl plating will you compromise the operational parameters of the air bags. I don't know but it will not hurt to ask for someone who is qualified in that area to check it out. In my mind it's a bit like getting a steering alignment done after an accident, I would not accept any front end work with out some one indicating that all repairs and alignments were done to the standard and tolerances required by the manufacturers specs.

KK

Nissan Bar to suit is available same day from local nissan spares $1500.00 Retail, even cheaper Trade.

Hi Ed,
'IF' the bar was legal before the crash but is not after it has been repaired then the insurance company has not met it's obligations.

KK

Who is to say that it won't be legal after the repair??

With my limited knowledge with Air Bag compliant bullbars, I would think that as long as the crush can attachment from the bar to the mounting points is either undamaged or replaced if damaged then there would be no issue with having the bar repaired.


Cheers Kev

Also he has not mentioned if the Air Bags deployed either.

The factory bar does not have a seperate crush can between the chassis and the bar, it is one peice with the bar hence my concern and no the airbags didn't deploy as the other vehicle absorbed the bulk of the impact(was written off)

Well that's the way I am starting to lean on the subject, how can they say it's the same when the plate peices that hold it are all mangled.

Will it handle a 10 000 lb winch still?

After talking to a few people in the industry about insurer they have told me they are notorious for sending repairs to the cheapest repairer regardless of their reputation.

Thanks Nick,
I knew someone that's been there before would surface, much appreciated.