North American B210s have "park bench" safety bumpers. Other countries use a stylish trim bumper.
Contents |
Worldwide Style
Front
Rear
Some countries used a narrow license plate cutout (e.g. Japan) and other countries used wide plate cutout (e.g. Australia)
Wide Plate
World Bumper doesn't quite cover holes on North America rear end
Narrow Plate
North America
USA and Canada market. For 1974, USA models got large safety bumpers to meet Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards regulation 215(b). The mandate that created the "park-bench" bumpers were not about safety, but part of the Cost Saving Act. The idea was to reduce the cost of repair of minor accidents (below 5 mph) and so benefit the consumer. For more details, see FMVSS 215.
- 1974 non-chrome, no rubber overriders, black sight shield
- 1975 different color, rubber overriders, black sight shield
- 1976 chrome beam with rubber ends, rubber overriders, Coupe has body color-keyed rear sight shield.
- 1977-1978. The external appearance of the bumpers has been improved
1975 - non-chrome with overriders (grille is 1978)
1976 - Chrome beam with many bolts
1977 - Chrome beam bumper with fewer bolts
Rear panel
A rear panel is used in USA instead of a beaver panel.
- 1974-1975: body color-keyed
- 1976-1978 Sedan: body color-keyed
- 1976-1978 Coupe: black
Retrofitting Worldwide Bumpers
You will need make up new custom brackets to mount the bumpers.
When fitting the smaller bumpers there's two holes, from where the 5mph bumper shocks/brackets mount. And the new bumper covers the top half of them. So a new beaver panel is not really needed.
NOTE: 1200 bumpers don't quite fit the B210. They need to be bent a little bit and are narrower.
Barracuda sells B210 bumper in steel about $300
The wide-cutout bumper has just happens to line up perfectly the with lower valence on a North America B210, but the JDM bumper has a smaller plate cut-out, about the size of a US license plate. the JDM bumper makes for a cleaner install, but the wide-cutout bumper may be cheaper and easier to obtain out of Australia.