Hey!

I recently bought a wonderful 2002 Monte Carlo SS from a retired couple. I live up in Michigan, and it was their designated summer car. My plan was to keep the car until it died, it only has 74k miles on it. With the 3.8L V6, I was hoping to get around 175k-200k miles off of it. And hopefully it’d last me through my undergrad and graduate years.

Unfortunately, I managed to hit a deer at a decently high speed. Probably around 45-50mph. The hood, front bumper, passenger headlight and fog light, and side fender all got hit pretty good. We’ve been to local collision and auto body shops and they all want to total it out.

I’m hoping to restore the car back. I have no experience with cars, I don’t even know how to change the oil, so it’ll definitely be a project. But I know that the car has a lot of life left if I can manage to restore it.



I’m thinking about buying this;

https://www.carparts.com/bumper-cover/replacement/kit-60615-14

It has all the parts I need, and I’d most likely take it into a local body shop to do the entire painting process for me. Since I’m so new to all this, would this be a good purchase? Or should I try digging around the junkyard / Facebook Marketplace to find parts. I’m not too concerned with whether it’s OEM from GM, I just need a good clean fit that normal eyes wouldn’t pick up on.

 

That's definitely totalled from an insurance perspective. Any body shop should still fix it if you want it to as long as you're paying.

If youre trying to DIY repair it, IMO the best bet for these cases is to scour local / within a few hour drive junkyards. Try to find one with a blown engine / rear damage / etc where the whole front clip is intact. That way you can get all of the panels you need along with all of the fasteners and trim. If youre taking it to a paint shop at the end anyways, then color won't matter.

One warning though, it's almost certainly not going to be an un bolt / bolt on fix. Thats part of the reason body work is so expensive as they often need to bend and straighten the body mount sheet metal behind to properly hold a non crumpled panel now. But at least with new OEM panels, you can bolt the undamaged parts in place to find what needs bent / by how much.

For someone that's never done mechanical work before, this is pretty deep stuff- but if you're motivated, everyone has to start somewhere.

 

Thank you.

I appreciate the insight! I'll start looking around junkyards after finals are done. I was planning on just buying replacement parts online, but decided to hold off until I got a reply on here.

 

There's nothing inherently wrong with buying aftermarket online either. Fitment is usually worse (especially the super cheap places), but it doesn't sound like youre too worried about that.

My bigger thing would be cost. Whole running / driving high mileage w bodies only bring a couple grand - one with a blown engine/ trans or rear ended totalled body damage is basically down to scrap metal value. I'd just think you should be able to get the parts for less than aftermarket (especially considering how outrageous shipping will be) and have better fitment to boot.

 

Well that hurts, a low mile 02 and hit a deer, dang tough break. Putting this Monte back in order should not be to crazy, but it will take some patience. I would start asking friwnds if they have a body shop guy who does work off the clock, like at thier home garage or such. There are going to be challenges as Bumpin mentioned, positioning distorted brackets properly to have a visually desirable finished rebuild.

I have a a red 2002 Monte hood. Removed it from my 2002 Monte after about 10k miles, went to a fiberglass hood. It's just been sitting in my garage for 15 years or so, along a wall, it's in pretty decent shape. Would have to be rubbed out with polishing compound or such. Kept a blanket over it most of the time. If interested, lmk, be hard to match a after market company price with shipping and all. See what they would want for one shipped and I may be able to match its price. Can attach a couple pics if you are interested. Would have to crate it up and such to survive the journey.

 

There are definitely ways to bring this car back.

As bumpin said, you can source a lot of parts from salvage yards. Sometimes you can get lucky to find panels already in the color you need. I would be concerned with the fenders, trying to find ones that the bottoms are not already rotted away can be hard to do in certain areas. I know a chain of salvage yards called Pull-A-Part that will list part prices online. That can help you decide "new aftermarket vs salvage".

Even if the body itself does not need anything serious done to it, there are other items to address. Impact/crash bar, plastic bumper re-enforcement, and misc things.

Do some research, price things out and go from there.

 

Here is a suggestion: the MC is usually pretty common in the salvage yards, if you can find a U-pull or U-wrench it type yard. That means you go there pay a fee to get in and find the car and take the parts off of it.
This is good for figuring out how to remove the parts and then when you get it home to fix your car you know how to put it on.
If you screw it up at the yard it's now big deal because if you can't get it done you don't have to buy it.

I go to them when I can and I have found some nice stuff and learned how to remove it too. Just and idea!! Good luck!!

 

Thank you everyone for the tips! I've just finished up with finals, so I have much more free time on my hands. I've also talked to my Uncle about it a little bit, he's much more knowledgeable when it comes to cars, as he works at a GM plant currently. Between me and him, I'm hoping I'll be able to fix the Monte back up! I'll keep you guys updated with all the progress. I'm hoping to go to a junkyard sometime this week!