So I think I am going to square up my front end before I put my new stripes on. The car was squished a bit on these parts, one side worse than the other:

Somebody before me did a pretty good job of somehow fitting out the frame mount location and it looks pretty good on the outside but if you look from where the front cover meets the side fenders, there no gap (as in almost smooshed) at the lower part of the seam and fine at the top.

I am thinking I want to get at the parts highlighted and try to bang them back out to the correct geometry. In other threads folks here suggest this is doable with some good banging.

My other choice is to loosen those bolts and wedge in some more shims to square it up. What do you guys think? Maybe leave well enough alone and wedge and shim it up with it all connected up ?

About how much time am I looking at to get the front off?

 

i would say 1-2 hours.
then 4 bolts on each side to remove front crash bar.

 

But Mike did it in 12 mins on the video.

 

I use what they call "Nyloc" nuts on just about everything.
That's a nut with a nylon insert so they will not back out on you.

You can find them at any hardware store.
= https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyloc_nut