Repainting the bumpers, flares, and stripes on my 1991 Jeep Cherokee XJ Laredo.
While the white body paint still looks good, the grey stripes on my 1991 XJ Cherokee had gotten pretty faded. I decided to get my Dad to help me fix that.
The ribbed strips on the side had shrunk and warped over the years. They would not look right even if repainted. We debated on removing the strips, but I really like the look. I call them Testarossa stripes because they remind me of the vents on the side of a Testarossa Ferrari.
I picked up a donor Jeep with good strips and was able to remove them successfully. I used a heat gun and a putty knife to carefully peel them away.
I did not want tape lines showing, so I removed the flares from my Jeep. I use lots of PB blaster and carefully worked the nuts back and forth as I took them off. I was mostly successful and got most of them off without breaking them. I also removed the bumpers so Dad could remove the end caps and bumper guards before paint.
My fender flares were actually in worse shape than they appeared at first so we elected to use some spares we had been hoarding. Also, the two rear metal brackets that hold the flares on were rusted so these were replaced as well.
The paint Dad used was slightly glossier and slightly darker than the original. But I think it looks even better than the original so we went with it.
Dad stripped the old grey tape off using a plastic razor and Goo Gone. He then painted the entire stripe area grey.
We used 3m double sided emblem tape to attach the new cladding strips. The hardest part of the whole job was peeling the red backer tape off the adhesive strips. We finally found a razor blade helped get it started.
We put the bumpers back on and aligned them. We used the bumper guards to line up the most rearward cladding strip. The very short strip at the front is curved so we lined that up so the curve fit. Then we lined the to door strips up with those on each end.
We also painted the rock rails to match so the body lines would carry on through the rocker area. The mounting bolts I had originally used had rusted badly and some broke trying to remove them. I went back with Stainless bolts to see if that helps.
With it all back together and the dust washed off, it looks even better than it did when I got it nearly 30 years ago.
