I went to pick up my F150 from the body shop today (long story, I'll start another thread with pics inna bit here) and the gap between the front bumper and the grill was weird. There was easily room for two fingers between the two at the front middle, but it narrowed to less than a pinkies width at the outside where the bumper end caps meet the fenders. The net effect was for the bumper to appear angled down towards the pavement in front of the truck.

I haven't had the truck long enough to know, is this normal and just looks weird because I'm being critical, or should that gap be even all the way across the front?

 

should be even....or closer to even at any rate

 

I think I might know. If you post a pic of the front of the truck, I can be sure. The grills on the 97-98's were different, and in the middle of the assembly it did not dip down like the 99-03's. That would definitely cause it to have that gap.

 

Mine's an '01, but they did replace the grill with a recon part.

I made them keep the truck and tear it back down to verify that the brackets are straight, I'll call them in the morning and see if they can verify what year the front grill came from.

 

does it look similar to this? This is an early grill ('97-98) with a later model ('99+) style bumper.

 

yikes that bumper scares me.

 

Thanks, this is good. I'm headed back down there in the morning, I'll compare this with what they put on there. I think the grill that's on there now follows the scoop in the bumper, so maybe they match. Looking at the pic you posted, it seems like you can just start to see the gap between headlight frame and bumper widening as it gets closer to the center of the truck, so maybe that is sorta normal and I'm just being picky.

I'm gonna go troll the pics thread, but does anybody else have a closeup of the front of an '99 or later front bumper and grill?

 

No it should be about 1" from corner to corner.. If it isnt, the bumper brackets need to be aligned correctly or straightened.