I've got a mystery on my hands.
Part of the front license plate of our Rav4 keeps getting bent forward about 45 degrees, maybe more. The same area on the plate consistently gets bent. This has been going on for two years, since we bought the car.
I only notice it when the car is stopped and I'm outside the car, such as when it's parked in the driveway. When I notice it I'll bend it back as flat as I can get it. Then, weeks or months later, I'll notice it's bent again.
I can rule out the following:
1. It's not from bumping into, scraping, or snagging on any foreign object. My wife and I are both very careful drivers and besides we would notice something like that, especially if it kept happening again and again.
2. It's almost certainly NOT the work of pranksters. The same thing happened to the plate when we lived in another part of town, and since we moved it's continued to happen. (Both areas were very quiet and safe anyway.) My wife drove the car to work and had three different jobs in different parts of town and the plate would get bent regardless, so it wasn't pranksters at one of those places either. Besides, what kind of strange prank would that be??
I tend to notice the plate is bent after returning from a trip that involved more than 10 or 15 minutes on the freeway, but I can't think of any reason why driving on the freeway would cause part of the license plate to bend forward. It takes a good amount of force for me to bend it by hand, and if the force of the wind was going to bend the plate at all it wouldn't be bending it forward.
Obviously I'm not going to post a photo of my license plate to an internet forum, so I created a diagram (see attached). The gray rectangle denotes the area that consistently gets bent forward. The two little circles represent where the screws hold the plate to the front fender.
Anyone else ever had an issue like this? Any theories on what's happening?
Part of the front license plate of our Rav4 keeps getting bent forward about 45 degrees, maybe more. The same area on the plate consistently gets bent. This has been going on for two years, since we bought the car.
I only notice it when the car is stopped and I'm outside the car, such as when it's parked in the driveway. When I notice it I'll bend it back as flat as I can get it. Then, weeks or months later, I'll notice it's bent again.
I can rule out the following:
1. It's not from bumping into, scraping, or snagging on any foreign object. My wife and I are both very careful drivers and besides we would notice something like that, especially if it kept happening again and again.
2. It's almost certainly NOT the work of pranksters. The same thing happened to the plate when we lived in another part of town, and since we moved it's continued to happen. (Both areas were very quiet and safe anyway.) My wife drove the car to work and had three different jobs in different parts of town and the plate would get bent regardless, so it wasn't pranksters at one of those places either. Besides, what kind of strange prank would that be??
I tend to notice the plate is bent after returning from a trip that involved more than 10 or 15 minutes on the freeway, but I can't think of any reason why driving on the freeway would cause part of the license plate to bend forward. It takes a good amount of force for me to bend it by hand, and if the force of the wind was going to bend the plate at all it wouldn't be bending it forward.
Obviously I'm not going to post a photo of my license plate to an internet forum, so I created a diagram (see attached). The gray rectangle denotes the area that consistently gets bent forward. The two little circles represent where the screws hold the plate to the front fender.
Anyone else ever had an issue like this? Any theories on what's happening?
