First Project with my new bender

[Fusion213]

Here's my first bender project, a new front bumper. I haven't ran a front bumper since... 2002 when I bent my bumper and cracked my radiator in an unfortunate offroad incident where I might have pretty much rammed into the side of a ditch. So, finally after all these years, I've decided to build a front bumper for myself.

So far i've got this:

And here's a picture of the bender, it's made by probender.com, it's the model 4, it uses pro-tools dies.

 

[410Fortune]

very very nice! Your first bends ever?

 

[kert0307]

Nice, I'm impressed you made that main outer tube out of one piece and it lined up that well.

 

[Fusion213]

Yeah, I did a few test bends, then I started on this. If the main outer tube was really off, I was going to cut it up and weld it back together because I didn't know how accurate I could get it.

 

[RockRanger]

looks great.

 

[Fusion213]

I need some suggestions. I want this bumper to be able to bolt up, so I can remove it when necessary. What kind of brackets could I build to bolt this on? Running bolts through the side would be tough because of those bulges on the end of the frame.

 

[railman]

i took some 3/16 plate and "boxed" the frame horn on the end to give me a flat surface to mount to.

you can sort of see in this picture

l8r, John

 

[Fusion213]

What did you do about the bumps on the outside and inside edges of the frame?

 

[railman]

i may not have been clear enough......

i put the plate over the "bumps" on the inside and outside of the frame so my bolts had a nice flat mating surface

l8r, John

 

[410Fortune]

Ihave also seen the frame horns simply cut off, no more ripples...... who needs factory bumper mount horns with ripples? My James Duff bumper simply bolts on over the ripples with a backing plate, like a sandwich

 

[Fusion213]

I ended up cutting the bumps on the outboard side of the frame rails out and i'm going to weld in a flat plate in place. To think of it... I should've done that to the other bumps when I was putting in a steering box!

 

[glfredrick]

Ihave also seen the frame horns simply cut off, no more ripples...... who needs factory bumper mount horns with ripples? My James Duff bumper simply bolts on over the ripples with a backing plate, like a sandwich

I cut mine also.

 

[mounty71]

Fusion, i've got to honestly say, you aren't very good at keeping your threads up-to-date. We want pics! You never updated your SAS thread either.

 

[Fusion213]

I'm sorry, i'm really terrible at keeping these threads up to date. You should see what i've got planned for when I get back from this deployment.

If you've got the imagination, i'll tell you what I did. I ended up cutting the "crumple pockets" out of the outboard sides of the framerails. I welded in some plate in the places I cut out. I then made brackets to go over the new plates on the side AND another plate on the bottom to make an angle iron looking bracket. I welded in a piece of tubing connecting the two brackets, drilled 3 1/2" holes per side and already had two 1/2" holes on the bottom from my old tow hook locations and there's a huge hole on the bottom of the frame from the factory. The crossbar is where the bumper mainly comes off of and there's tubes coming out of the outboard side of the brackets going to the wraparound headlight portion to help support it. I welded two 1" thick shackle mounts to the forward portion. There's room for a winch plate to go in when I get back. I do have pictures on my computer back in the living spaces, i'll try to upload them tonight for you and some of my after pictures for my SAS, coilover deal.

 

[mounty71]

Ha, no worries, just giving you a hard time. I think i can picture what you're describing. Looking forward to seeing pics.

 

[Fusion213]

Here's a picture of the bumper from my trip to URE.

 

[mounty71]

That is looking so sweet! The whole truck looks really mean.

 

[lifeguard379]

ya it dose. is there a build thread?

 

[Fusion213]

Sort of, it's kind of scattered everywhere and I didn't take lots of pictures during the process.

 

[Sams01XplrSprt]

looks great keep up good work