DIY USP completed - Found part that makes it different from stock upper

[nananana4k]

I bought Ese's front USP bumper that got damaged in the accident. The lower seemed fine cosmetically except for scrapes on the bottom.

It would also help to tell me how much to cut when doing the DIY.



When I started pulling off the USP lower I found that the USP upper is exactly the same as a regular A4 upper except for this black plastic piece on that is riveted to it.

It seems that the dealers take an A4 upper, cut it, add this plastic part and relabel the part as an USP upper. The black piece has the lower holes for the center grill and tabs to secure the USP lower.



At first I thought "This is an A4 stock upper, not a USP." But After checking the forums, people have confirmed this is what it looks like after you remove the center grilles. This is how it comes from the dealer.

I drilled the rivets out and this is the piece that is causing all the fuss between getting a USP upper or DIY with a stock upper.



Here's the part number.

8E0 807 233D BD0

I asked Greg about it and he says it's part of the bumper so you can't get it by itself. It's too bad, it really, really makes the DIY easy. I am trying to persuade Kirk to make something similar to it for group sales.




Well, it's time to hack away. Many thanks to Matt Devo's instructions that seems to be the guideline. I couldn't find my dremel so I had to mini saw the cutting which at first you get this "I'm going to f*ck up my bumper feeling" but goes away pretty soon.

*warning - I cut the 2 middle tabs of the 4 middle tabs by the center grill which most USP DIY do not do so you can screw the USP lower to them.



Some more cutting. You can see here that when your are DIY, there are guidelines that show you where to cut.



Cutting up near the fog up to this "marker"



Here you can see how the black plastic piece was made for the A4 stock after the cuts. This goes into the curves of the upper and gives support between the upper and lower. The rivet holes guides where to drill, then I use zip ties to secure it. Fast and sturdy.



Here's what it looks like after it is zipped up.



If you look at the part to the right of the fogs, the column that goes from the top to bottom of the bumper, I cut these because it is how the USP upper has it, but all DIY do not cut into this part but under it. I had to remove part of this to fit the black piece that will be supporting this area.

Here is the USP added on.



And since I didn't have USP grills and didn't want to make my own(I went shopping for parts at Home Depot and decided I'd rather have stock ones) I zip tied the stock ones for now until the ones from Greg comes in.



I'll take more pics once the USP grills come in. We'll that's about it. No repainting needed on the upper piece since the stock USP grills will cover the silver areas, and all done in one afternoon.

[Edible]

Possible chance for higher res shots? :)

[nananana4k]

Sure, I'll try to edit now.

[dirtybrd]

Nice deal!!

[akaEsCo01]

Looking good bro. I'm offended you even thought I sold you a stock upper lol, j/k. Turns out buying the whole bumper instead of just the lower piece worked out. You probably have the sturdiest USP retrofit on here since you got the skeleton from my bumper .

Reps are much appreciated

[nananana4k]

Looking good bro. I'm offended you even thought I sold you a stock upper lol, j/k. Turns out buying the whole bumper instead of just the lower piece worked out. You probably have the sturdiest USP retrofit on here since you got the skeleton from my bumper.

LOL, I was scared a dealership ripped you off. But alot of other USP owners thought the same thing. I was trying to find the thread here on AZ that shows the pics USP owners took that questioned if theirs was real too.

[akaEsCo01]

Lol, after all the work I put into finding my car when I first bought it, that would have been one hell of a surprise, not to mention a damn good copy cat.

[nananana4k]

hehe, yeah. That's what I was thinking.