240Z: Rear bumper brackets and front-end bodywork

During my recent work at the front fender areas, i realized that the corner where the headlight buckets go on the driver side must have had a hit at some point and the panel was slightly bent backwards:

I started to enjoy bearing metal panels with a hammer recently, so i got myself a proper hammer and dolly and started to hammer it straight.
Worked out pretty well and i’m happy i didn’t have to pay a bodyshop for another 30minutes of work.

While doing bodywork anyway, i thought it’s time to test-fit the rear bumper. I didn’t want to mess up my NOS bumper mounts (i’ll save them for the final assembly). I realized that my old ones were pretty messed up.

A bit of hammering and bending and things started to look usable

Then i recut the threads because the bolts wouldn’t fit with the thic coat of primer that ended up in the holes:

And last but not least i put some rust-converter on the straightened brackets and installed them on the rear. But i forgot to take photos of that.

Then i got a bunch of panels in questionable condition from germany.

What is special about those front lower valances you ask? Three of them are specific for European spec cars, with the additional mounting points for the euro-spec front spoiler:

Here you can see them with my (very wobbly) front lip:

I once had a NOS one, but it seems i sold it a while ago (back then i thought i’d go for the xenon front bumper anyway). and now i hate myself for it. Luckily one of the corner valances seemed to be half-NOS. It still had the original protective black primer and sticker on it, but it also had a bit of rust and remaints of a front bumper that was once attached to it. BTW: those EU-spec corner valances have a closed hole for the turn signals (we got the ones mounted on top of the front bumper) and again holes at the bottom for the front lip:

Well. it took me a few minutes to get those rusty old bolts out, but now i have again a complete (albait the center part is not very fresh) set of EU-spec lower valances.