Bumper Economics

Living in Washington, DC and parking both my cars on the street here on Capitol Hill I’ve long thought there should be a better, more durable approach to bumpers. Body – color plastic bumpers are attractive coming out of the showroom and may work well for people who garage their cars but not every owner has that luxury – particularly urban dwellers, like me. I daily observe otherwise well maintained new vehicles with unsightly dimples and scratches on their rear bumpers; often due to careless “touch and feel” parking by others, not their own negligence. Parking sensors are only half of the solution.

Couldn’t there be a manufacturer offered, abrasion resistant, clear peel - off coating ala NASCAR windshields that could periodically be removed from the bumper, revealing a smooth surface. Or, what about a self healing resin insert for the most vulnerable part of a bumper – generally the area where someone else’s license plate screws tend to leave dimples. When I see hundreds of dollars of damage on otherwise nice cars it makes me nostalgic for the bad old days of black polyurethane, or even chromed steel bumpers that actually did what their names implied; that is, receive - and - give little bumps with minimal damage. The sustainability angle here is that all the little bumps and scratches eventually add up into costly repairs, requiring petroleum based patching and painting that should be avoidable with a little thoughtful design. It would save car owners, and perhaps insurance companies, millions of dollars a year!