This is the first version of the bumper I built for it.
I love the look and the practicality/utility of the D-links, but I wouldn't want them on my daily driver. They are noisy, I tried to cure that with the tiny rubber bumpers on the bottom but that did nothing.
It left my winch hanging WAYYYYY too far out. I didn't like it.
So, I went back to my drawing board, and upgraded my situation. I was able to tuck the winch in another 7.5 inches by removing the bottom chrome tube and welding on another hitch receiver on top of the 3x5 tube with some fancy gussets. I had to trim that tiny piece of sheet metal in front of the rad to get that far back. After assembly I found I could have gone another inch, but, I'm still quite pleased.
For any of you wondering, the winch, in the winch basket, scales in at 130lbs. That is almost as much as me! I got it for Christmas, I had asked for a Big-Bad-Tow-Rope, because, well you need those when you go 4x4ing. And my dad being the awesome dad that he is, got me a 9500lbs Champion winch, complete with hitch basket, and a snatch block! Costco has them for sale right now for $370?
So, yes, when I need to I can un-pin it and put it on the back, and Ta'Da! I can winch out. But slogging 130lb poorly shaped hunk of metal thought 2(or more) ft of mud is about as much fun as you would imagine. Works alright when you have two guys, one on each handle.
So, as I (and I'm sure some of you) expected I would do, I bent the shiny flimsy outside part of my bumper. I slapped them on so the signal lights and tin would have SOME protection was we made our way down the trail. They were up to the job if the tree was 2" or smaller. But on the
Page 5 trip I tweaked a 4" tree with the outside of shiny part when I was sneaking through a tight spot.
The plan is to straighten that and put some 2"x2" tubing being there and weld it to the main body of the bumper. The chrome stuff is to thin and miserable to weld to so I suspect I will just bolt/screw it to the tubing. With the re-enforcement behind the lights and such will be protected and in the chrome part gets mangled then so be it, that just proves I'm not one of the pansy's who drives a jacked up truck that I don't use for work, just for looking tuff because I have a small _____. lol
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Page 1: The Beginning
Page 2: The Lift Build
Page 3: The Bumper Build, - YOU ARE HERE X
Page 4: Summer of 07' Wheeling
Page 5: Fall of 07' Wheeling
Page 6: Winter of 07' Work
Page 7: Ongoing/Winter of 08' Work
Page 8: A cool day of work
Page 9: Uploads for other pages, Ignore...
