I have an 06 R53 and am trying to get the front bumper off to get the car in service mode. I had this same issue with my 03 R53, but can't find any information on what I'm missing.
After getting the bumper cover off with no problem, I removed the 8 nuts and 2 bolts from the bumper carrier. Passenger side slides off with no problem, but the driver's side has a little bolt that's a pain in the **** to get at that it's getting hung up on.


Front view of bumper


There's the little bugger



There's about enough space to weasel in an open ended wrench and turn it maybe 1/8 turn at a time. On my 03, I went ahead and spent the time getting it out, but I really don't want to deal with that again if there's a way around it.

Any suggestions or links to a thread I didn't see are welcome.

 

I have had my front end apart twice in the last 3 weeks. I recall 4 nuts and one bolt on each side that fasten the bumper on. Are the studs left and the right the crash tube?

Check out Mod Minis FES YouTube video to see details.

 

Go on YouTube there is one in there on how to change your oil pan gasket and crankshaft o-ring he'll show you how to remove the front bumper.

 

Already have. Can you see the pics I posted? The 13mm nuts and bolts are all off. It's a 10mm bolt that I can only reach from the top of the bumper that's the problem.

 

There aren't any bolts that are hard to get at for the bumper. The ones you can't get at dont need to come off. You are missing something else if it's not coming loose.

 

That's what I thought, but was looking for ideas on what. Regardless, I went ahead with the same method I used on the other one, and turned the 10mm bolt loose - apparently nobody else has run into this issue?

Here's the little bolt that I was talking about. It looks like it's an adjustment bolt that sits in a standoff to hold the bumper in position spaced off the plastic modular front end, but that standoff is attached to the car on the passenger side and fused to the bumper on the driver's side.




Attached to MFE on passenger side





Attached to bumper on driver's side

 

Doesn't need to come off, just took my bumper off as well. I couldn't get it off at first and thought that was holding it on. The problem was the bumper was hanging on the threads from the studs, I had to give it a firm smack to get it off. Was just lodged on there good. Those small bolts to not need to come out

 

So in theory, then that little thing that's sticking into the driver's side of the carrier should just pop out. It's corroded in place pretty well, and whacking it with a hammer didn't seem to do much, which is why I went with just removing the bolt.

 

As far as I can tell that is just to help align the bumper. Don't hit the bolt with a hammer, smack the bumper from the backside. So hit the bumper on the side facing the car, applying the force in the direction away from the car. Mine popped off yanking it by hand real hard.

 

try this
https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...front-end.html

 

My bumper stuck pretty hard. I had to yank a decent bit to get it off.

 

We have a front bumper removal tech article on our site. Maybe see if it'll be helpful.

 

+1 I did then also rubber mallet on the aluminum brace and hit the studs with PB blaster so the thread slide past the metal and dont get hung up.

 

Dang, had to take mine off again yesterday and some of the threaded inserts came out of the frame, gonna have to sand down and weld them back on I guess.

 

If you haven't figured out yet, those are locating bushings that move slightly for variations in bumper support geometry. When re-installing the support, hand tighten the two bushings just enough so they can move a little as you put the support on. You'll then have to tighten those bolts once the support is installed.