hmmm, i wonder if you could hit it with a heat gun for a bit to soften it up and then push. earlier in the morning, the fenders were very hard and i thought there was no way they were going to come out. however, once it warmed up and the sun beat on the plastic for a while, it got a lot softer and made pushing the other end out very easy.

 

I was behind a guy last weekend who brought down a 4-5" diameter tree with his passenger side rear fender and only put a dent in the plastic no body damage. I was impressed how well it held up.

 

yup, i am starting to here this more and more and i think i'm now content with just sticking with what i got. as i have said, i have seen other aftermarket flares take on hits and actually do body damage.

 

i hear ya. fortunately, the installation of a 1" body lift gave me the clearance i needed for 37's but had they not, i would have considered trimming my fenders a bit to make things work. hell, if someone were to come out with a factory like high clearnace fender replacement that was made of a similar material, i think i would be all over it

 

I had the same sort of dent on mine. Mine was not done on the trail, but rather at a gas station somewhere in Nebraska while driving across country, and it happened when I backed up too fast forgetting that I had a uhaul trailer attached and it jack-knifed into my flare . No body damage though, and it was only $60 to replace the flare, so I was cool with that.

This is what it looked like after I backed into it. I was unable to pop it out either:

http://www.vjg.cc/JeepJK/offroad-9-2.../target21.html

Apparently the image tags don't work for me, probably need to post more.

 

That is exactly why I like these fenders. They will tear away or dent before any body damage is done. The JK fenders are even better in that they involve less of the body than the TJ.

Im always affraid to bolt something serious onto the body and subsequently tear the sheet metal when it gets hung.

 

I have a similar story but not with my jeep. I had an 05 honda element, the front and back corners are made of the same kind of plastic. I was being stupid once and not paying attention to the happy decorative boulder at the end of my friend's driveway and slammed into it with my front corner when I was pulling in... 2 weeks after I bought the thing. My friend saw me hit it, he said it looked like the whole front corner caved in, then popped back out and looked like normal as soon as I backed away. When I got out and checked, there was nothing but a little scratch.

That experience is what made me consider the X or Rubicon over the Sahara, just because I knew that plastic would be a lot more durable, and even if I did scratch that part up it would still look a lot better than painted metal with the paint all scratched and chipped and dented

 

We have been useing a heat gun to warm up the flairs then rebending them with gloves on for almost a year now and works almost every time except when there is a hard kink in them.

 

Thanks for this info guys, I have been looking into whether the aftermarket fenders would be worth it, but it looks like the OEM's are easy to fix and cheap to replace. Too bad there isn't some kind of functional spacer kit for the OEM fenders, one could just add the length they need. That would be I am sure someone could build it. I personally like to OEM flares best.