X-Line Retrofit Mission 3/5 Successful! (X Line Rear Bumper Retrofit)

[Cam330i]

Hello to all my fellow BMW Brothers and Sisters!
How is everyone?

I am doing very well.

A Little story: I have been a huge fan of the X-Line package ever since i saw my friend's X1 wearing the same Midnight Blue Metallic color with the X-Line package. I think that the color contrasts nicely with the X-Line's Silver accents.

Since my X1 has no line, i have been in the progress of retrofitting the X-Line. I have successfully retrofitted the Upper and Lower Grilles and the lower rear bumper which brings us here.

I wanted to share my bumper experience considering it was quite an interesting process.

***DISCLAIMER***
1. For some reason, this website only likes the pictures i take via Snapchat, a social media app, and so some of these pictures will have random captions and emoji's on there, so bear with me on that.
2. My car's name is Elliot. So in case your wondering "who the hell is Elliot" just know that it is my cars name
3. In this process your current bumper might be slightly damaged, so factor that in.
4. I would also buy the bumper from your dealer, will explain that later on.
5. This only works and is tested for vehicles WITHOUT park sensors
6. This works for Sport, X-Line, and non line users. The M-Sport might be totally different and is so far not tested.
***DISCLAIMER***

Obtaining the lower bumper: Difficulty 5/5 Stars

- The hardest part of this whole process is getting a hold of the bumper in a cost efficient manner. I always use getbmwparts.com to get all of my bmw parts, but this is the only time i didn't use them. The problem is not the price of the bumper, but the shipping of the bumper. The X-Line bumper without park sensors is 167$ but because this item falls under the bumper category, their shipping is a standard 195.00$. So a part that cost 167$ can easily turn into 362$ which might round out to around 400$ at the end of everything. I wasn't going to pay that much for a part.

So i was nosing around online in hopes that someone might offer the part on ebay or perhaps a dealer might have a special going on. I found on ebay the bumper that i wanted but it was burned.

A few dealers offered the part for cheaper, but again, since i live far from the area, they would have to freight ship it, which again will cost too much money.

One week ago from today i went to get my car serviced at my local BMW dealership and since I am crazy obsessed with BMW's, i was talking to a few of the guys about it. One guy had mentioned to go to the parts department, perhaps since the dealer is so close you wouldn't have to pay for shipping. I said to myself "what do i have to lose"

So i went to talk to the guy about the parts and because he saw that i was somewhat desperate, he gave me a 20% discount on the lower bumper that i wanted and he would have it by the next day. So i paid a total of 289$ for the part including tax.

Two days later i came early in the morning to pick up the part, and it was from there i realized why shipping was so crazy... the item is extremely delicate and soft and care must be used when handling this item.

So now that's out of the way, lets talk about installation.

2. Installation: Difficulty 3/5 Stars

- As with any work on a BMW, specifically the X1, it is never a walk in the park. Everything is so packed tightly and neatly, that you will have to go through 3 different obstacles just to get to one. Confused yet?

The thing that sucks is that the X1 is not popular to begin with and so we couldn't find anything about how to remove the lower bumper, maybe i am the first one to post how?

The first thing we did was remove all of the screws on the bottom of the bumper. Not hard what so ever. We then began to remove the plastic pieces at the bottom that protected the car from rocks and other damaging materials. Believe it or not, the bumper itself has a bunch of clips that you just pop in and out so that was a good sign.

At first, my friend suggest that we just pop out the silver pieces and leave your car bumper in tact. when doing that we realized that the X-Line silver piece has specialized clippings to hold it into the bumper, so we came into conclusion that the whole bumper must be removed

So following that, we tried our hardest to push the bumper out of it's clippings, but it was too snugged in. So i took a hammer style screwed driver and i placed it in between the lower and upper bumper. (Basically were the black plastic part of your bumper meets the colored portion of the upper bumper) So when i did that, the bumper came out of it's first clippings and from there we basically popped the bumper out of it's place.

You might think "you are home free" - well no. The bumper had two screws that held it attach to the rear wheel housing. So what we had to do was basically break the original bumper so de-attach it from the wheel housing.

So now the bumper is off and slightly broken. We then took the new bumper and we had to cut off the part that was suppose to be attached to the rear wheel housing, because the original bumper pieces are still attached to it. You can't get inside of their to unscrew it because it is so tucked in. you would have to remove the upper bumper to get to those, therefore the reason why you have to move 50 different things to get to one. -__-

Don't worry, the screws and all the clippings are more than enough to keep the lower bumper in tact. So after cutting off those two pieces, it was just as simple as putting the bumper in its right clippings. Then after we re-installed the protection pieces and also the screws and that's a wrap.

The bumper is nicely in place and you wouldn't know the difference.

The X-Line silver piece is much brighter than the silver piece that comes with the base X1. It also gives the car more ground clearance because the silver piece is placed higher. In low dim settings, the silver piece is still bright and it and the Midnight blue look fantastic and it doesn't look as dull as the original one. Overall is was really fun and the payoff is great, its definitly worth the investment, especially if you have a steep drive way and or if you want to stand out from the crowd.

A few things to keep in mind -
1. Since alot of people like Black, this also works for those who want to Retrofit the Sport Line. You just buy the sport line materials instead of the X-Line.
2. As mentioned this works for X1's without park sensors. I am sure you can install it, but i am not sure how to get the sensors to play with the new bumper, maybe have a dealer do it.
3. The sport line's bumper is cheaper than the X-Line's for some reason. The bumper without park sensors for sport line was only 90$ excluding shipping.
4. Check on ebay for sport line, i saw a few bumpers for sale for cheap.
5. Interestingly enough there is only a 10$ difference between bumpers with and without the park sensors.

Please let me know if you have any questions, this is as accurate as i can get, but i am willing to help my siblings out

Have a good one and enjoy these pictures

SPECIAL SHOUT OUT TO BOB SMITH BMW IN CALABASAS

[Cam330i]

Parts:

1. X Line Rear lower bumper w/o park sensors: 51127345038
2. X Line Rear lower bumper w/ Park sensors: 51127345041

3. Sport Line Rear lower bumper w/o park sensors: 51127345039
4. Sport Line Rear lower bumper w/ park sensors: 51127345041

[zeevette]

Great write-up, as usual. I agree that your color combo looks way better with that trim piece.

[LevinBR]

You had mentioned that the xLine bumper's silver piece has special clippings. I have an xLine X1 and I am interested in painting the silver piece. Can it be removed from the gray bumper? I'd like to avoid painting it while it's still attached to the main bumper.

Thanks!

[Cam330i]

I have attached more photos of the bumper for anyone who wants to see