Anyone repair a rear end collision by pulling it out at home?

[idosubaru]

Anyone ever pull the rear end after being rear ended? I've donee bunch of fronts.

 

It's pushed in closer to wheels but not rubbing. Can that be pulled out at home to increase gap behind the tire? Or is the metal/integrated body too beefy back there?

 

I assume the light wrinkles in the rear quarter panels are untouchable, I'm not painting this car.

 

It's a friends 02 outback sedan hit in rear. Runs and drives fine gonna get it as good as I can with 3 hours of work or less.

[lmdew]

You can move the bumper itself.  The holes in the frame could be elongated and then move the bumper back.

You have big trees there, you could chain it to a tree and go right to the metal frame of the bumper and give it a good pull.

 

The frame tube built into the body is multi layer and without a frame puller I doubt  you will get much.

 

Moving the bumper aft is most likely your best bet.

 

I have the 02 parting out, good rear, bumper, trunk lid, lights...

Larry

[idosubaru]

Thanks Larry!

 

I'll make a parts list.

 

Oh right the bumper wraps around to the tire so a fair amount of the gap issue will be there.

 

That makes sense, frame tube will be like the inner fender rails up front, not gonna budge those beasts. Focus on bumper and trunk

[Bushwick]

You want to pull the corner out, right? If you have access to a heavy truck, you try using a chain. You'll have to find a way to keep the car 100% static, then put the truck in a low gear and pull at a creep. Try and chain as far out to the crumpled corner as possible. A bumper support might be enough to wrap chain around. If you have access to a semi, dump truck, etc. it'll be fairly easy, but go VERY slow and don't stand anywhere near the chain in case it gets loose or flings a car part out.

 

In lieu of a truck, find a tree or well-anchored parking lot car-stop post (no light poles as those can break) and get almost taut on the chain, like leave about 4" slack then give some gas and try and "tug" it. Keep repeating until it straightens out. Again, I'd leave the metal bumper in place, then wrap the chain around the support near the crumpled corner and wrap the bumper a few times so it doesn't deform the sides of the support or rip it upwards. Don't go too fast or you'll end up with more damage.

[Scott in Bellingham]

having worked in a Auto Body shop simple answer is yes the issue is how to get

a hold of the spot that needs pulled out and how to hold the rest of the

car from moving and getting bent , in the shop we had a framework that would

clamp to the underside of the car at the pinch weld seams, it was always a issue

on how to grab the bent sheetmetal, it almost always got mangled , usually a few cuts and a

pull then rework the cuts and area and add a new part would fix it

[BooRadley522]

i have similar damage to my 99 legacy. I bent some bumper brackets for an old ranger back to straight once by heating them up then pounding them. I've been thinking of apllying this technique to the Legacy. I can see the wrinkles in the spare wheel storage, so I will remove all the interior flammable materials, heat up the wrinkles with a torch, and attach a chain to the tow loop on the back right then the other side of the chain to a tree. I will either let the car roll in neutral down hill or just tug on it in first gear, but i don't like the idea of the sudden jerk/stop on my drive train. A neutral roll sounds much better. I am somewhat lucky with the damage tho. the guy that hit it tried to swerve and only hit the right side, so that tow loop is positioned perfectly to pull out the damage. I cut the bumper of by the wheel to prevent rubbing on the tires.

[idosubaru]

Bushwick - Thsnks. I'll give it whatever I can in 2-3 hours then I'm done. It runs and drives with no issues but isn't worth much time to me.

 

I'll use a winch. Only thing I have with a low gear is a Kubota and it's definitely too small.

[sirtokesalot]

i have but it was not as bad as you are describing. i used a combination of a come along a tow strap and a hydraulic wedge. we strapped the front of the car to a tree and used the come along to pull on the back of the car form another tree. sledge hammers pry bars and such. we got it close i never took any before pictures but there was a gap on the drivers side where the rear hatch would not close it was about a 2 inch gap.the tail light would not bolt on ither. the whole drivers rear fender was pushed in about 6 to 8 inches. this is what we got it to after a few hours.