You would get it done on a sunny afternoon easy .... just take your time and buy at least two professional spot weld drills because thats the majority of the work .. you definately dont want to attepmt this with "Grandads old drills" ....
Tip ... if you dont weld the new one and just cover in waxoyl you must ensure front bumper holes are aligned ... cos its not easy aligning them while trying to refit the bumper on your own ...... i did it and took me as long to refit the bumper as it did to drill out the spot welds cos i didnt think to align the bumper bolt holes .... lol....
And remember if you have an Eagle eyed MOTer .. they might question you on welding .... so my advice is to nip it to garage and get a few spot welds .. then its done....... that said mine passed no isseus ... but it was WELL waxoyled lol
Overall its a very very easy job ... just the idea of drilling out welds seems daunting ..... Once you done one i reckon you could do another in under 2 hours easy
.... obvioulsy add time if you want to waxoyl it all as you go .. which i would highly recommend .... given the rust monster ...
Garage in Weston s Mare was offering replacement at £100 .... but they cut the old ones off halfway down and just weld the bottom part back on .. rather than removing the entire thing . ..... If you think about it, its a £25 part and then 2 hours labour @£50 an hour,..... so £100 to £125 would be reasonable .... charging more would just be a tax on our ignorance ...... "Oh yes mate its a big job .. have to take the bumper and rad and supports and this and that and then the origami needs twisting out of the flip flop " and that will be £450 for the pleasure
Rad doesnt need to be touched ... it will just hang when you remove old one ..... i took top crossmember off and lifted rad a little to clear rusty cross member... although again you might want to clean all the brackets that come off the old cross member as they will be rusty.
You will likely also need an old chisel and hammer to prise it off once you have got all the spot welds ..... doesnt take much
Its such an easy job that i now keep an eye out for MOT failures on the crossmember .... bought the last one for £160 .. replaced and sailed through mot .... then sold for £400 ... nice for a few hours work and keeps the Micras on the road
