plate bumper build... or another way to waste tons of time.

[HARDTRAILZ]

Nice!

[dvanbramer88]

looks better in person.

[NC_IslandRunner]

It looks good, not that I ever doubted you..

[bartonmd]

Here it is all finished up, I didn't get a picture while it was clean but I suppose it is what it is. I went ahead and drilled a couple small holes in the bumper to drain the water and it seems to do the job pretty alright. The ride is worlds better with all the weight up there. Even managed to get the winch wired up. Not too bad for some cobbled together piece of shit if I do say so myself. I even had a fella ask me where I bought it the other day lol
I cut off the flange on my radiator skid tonight so hopefully all the skids will be back on in a few days.

Looks good, but WOW, you N-E-E-D to move those shackle mounts!!! The fairlead is OK on that unsupported piece, because its forces are side to side and up and down. The shackle mounts, on the other hand, are pulling in the ONE direction in which that piece has ZERO strength! Hack them off of there and weld them on the under-angled part, right below the winch plate level, right in front of the frame rails (or as close as you can get to there, while still being on the part that faces forward and down).

Mike

[Cable810]

Looks good!!

[v7guy]

Here it is all finished up, I didn't get a picture while it was clean but I suppose it is what it is. I went ahead and drilled a couple small holes in the bumper to drain the water and it seems to do the job pretty alright. The ride is worlds better with all the weight up there. Even managed to get the winch wired up. Not too bad for some cobbled together piece of shit if I do say so myself. I even had a fella ask me where I bought it the other day lol
I cut off the flange on my radiator skid tonight so hopefully all the skids will be back on in a few days.

Looks good, but WOW, you N-E-E-D to move those shackle mounts!!! The fairlead is OK on that unsupported piece, because its forces are side to side and up and down. The shackle mounts, on the other hand, are pulling in the ONE direction in which that piece has ZERO strength! Hack them off of there and weld them on the under-angled part, right below the winch plate level, right in front of the frame rails (or as close as you can get to there, while still being on the part that faces forward and down).

Mike

Yeah those shackle mounts would kill somebody if they were welded like you're thinkin. They're the longer weld through style. I cut a hole through the fairlead mount, then slid them through.
They're welded to the winch plate, then also to the triangle reinforcements for the fairlead mount on the side, then to the upright area of the fairlead mount front and back. I heated up the shackle mounts with the OA torch to help get some deeper penetration.
If that's still not enough I need to know, but there's more area of that shackle mount welded to the winch plate than there would be if it was the other style that you just lay on a flat surface and weld around the perimeter.

[bartonmd]

That's better than I was thinking it was, but isn't as strong as it would be if the top of the fairlead mount was welded to something else, and boxed in. Can you get some pics of the back side, with them welded in?

Mike

[v7guy]

This is about the best I can do without taking the whole thing off the truck. you can see a little bit of the support for the fairlead that's its welded to. Guess I could make the lip for the fairlead mount a bit wider so that it extends back more and then I could box it in from the shackle mount to the winch plate. But I really figured it would be fine as is.

[bartonmd]

Well, let me put it like this... It'll probably be fine, but it's not something I'd personally sell to a customer. I'll preface that it'll probably be fine if you only pull very slightly up or straight level with the strap. That's the kind of thing that could bend the whole fairlead mount down if you are at the top of a hill or pointed upward and somebody jerks on it (or you jerk on somebody with it). It's almost definitely not going to fly off, but I could see it bending the fairlead mount if you pull on it the wrong direction.

e.g. if you pull on it like this (either vehicle), I could see it bending:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=463800470301080

Other view:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... L1IWkvN3ew

I'd do the shackle mounts like this, if it was me:


IMO, the way to reinforce it without moving the shackle mounts would be to extend a piece off the back, just as far under the winch as you can (this may already be your angled pieces that can't be seen very well in this pic), and do like I did with Regulator's 2" receiver above, and weld in a big gusset from right under the shackle mounts (right on the other side of the material from as far back as you can get that gusset on the top), welded to the front lower angle, and to the bottom mount. This will basically cantilever the shackle mounts and pull strength from the strong part of the bumper, and they should be pretty durable, then. Like below:

[Moots1288]

^ you said jerked on :happyface:

[drwfaulk]

^ you said jerked on :happyface:

damn, beat me to it!!!!!

[drwfaulk]

^ you said jerked on :happyface:

damn, beat me to it!!!!!

[Moots1288]

^ you said jerked on :happyface:

damn, beat me to it!!!!!

:highfive:

[v7guy]

So you're saying they could get enough load to buckle the winch plate upward, bend the ribs on the underside of the winch plate, twist those triangle gussets, and then bend over the fairlead mount? Seriously?

What you show above is exactly how it's laid out (excluding the gusset inside). When I put em there I figured I wouldn't see any more loading than the winch would place on it and that the reinforcement ribs on the underside of the winch plate would be enough to keep em from moving around... they are about 4 inches away from those ribs, but still.

I had originally planned to put a couple pieces in just like you show with the thought that it would help reinforce the underside of the bumper since that is probably whats going to get smacked by something when I'm going up and down stuff (and losing oil pressure lol). I figured it would transmit the load from the bottom area that was impacted up to the winch plate. In the end I decided to leave em out in my rush to get it on for the thanksgiving run. It still sits in the back of my mind that I should have put em in. I can definitely see how that inside gusset would strengthen it up for the shackle mount and the bottom of the bumper.

I'll pull it off sometime in the next few weeks and put em in, can't hurt.

[v7guy]

^ you said jerked on :happyface:

damn, beat me to it!!!!!

:highfive:

Mike and I are sharing the biscuit next TECORE

[dvanbramer88]

So you're saying they could get enough load to buckle the winch plate upward, bend the ribs on the underside of the winch plate, twist those triangle gussets, and then bend over the fairlead mount? Seriously?

How much kinetic energy does a 6000 pound truck rolling at ~10mph have? If you were stuck like Rich and I was pulling on you that hard, I could see it getting warped. Not bent down or anywhere close to flat, but tweak the fairlead outta shape. But I'm no expert.

And if maybe Matt would post videos sometime this century, we all could see the forces at play.

[bartonmd]

So you're saying they could get enough load to buckle the winch plate upward, bend the ribs on the underside of the winch plate, twist those triangle gussets, and then bend over the fairlead mount? Seriously?

What you show above is exactly how it's laid out (excluding the gusset inside). When I put em there I figured I wouldn't see any more loading than the winch would place on it and that the reinforcement ribs on the underside of the winch plate would be enough to keep em from moving around... they are about 4 inches away from those ribs, but still.

I had originally planned to put a couple pieces in just like you show with the thought that it would help reinforce the underside of the bumper since that is probably whats going to get smacked by something when I'm going up and down stuff (and losing oil pressure lol). I figured it would transmit the load from the bottom area that was impacted up to the winch plate. In the end I decided to leave em out in my rush to get it on for the thanksgiving run. It still sits in the back of my mind that I should have put em in. I can definitely see how that inside gusset would strengthen it up for the shackle mount and the bottom of the bumper.

I'll pull it off sometime in the next few weeks and put em in, can't hurt.

I wouldn't think it would bend the ribs on the under side or anything, but since there is such a small area on the winch plate, I would be concerned that it would deform the small area right around where it welds in. It wouldn't have to be bent very much to not look quite right, and to be REALLY hard to fix.

Mike

[v7guy]

That's going to piss me off trying to clean and weld up in there, it'd be even worse trying to fix it though. lol

Dave, 6000lbs at 10 miles per hour is around 22k lbft of pull with a recovery strap. That's getting a little scary as far as frame loads go, and 10mph is a pretty stout tug. Generally speaking our trucks are closer to 5000 lbs aren't they? In that case we'd be looking at 18k lbft with a recovery strap given the same scenario. That's a good little bit of pull.

[dvanbramer88]

That's going to piss me off trying to clean and weld up in there, it'd be even worse trying to fix it though. lol

Dave, 6000lbs at 10 miles per hour is around 22k lbft of pull with a recovery strap. That's getting a little scary as far as frame loads go, and 10mph is a pretty stout tug. Generally speaking our trucks are closer to 5000 lbs aren't they? In that case we'd be looking at 18k lbft with a recovery strap given the same scenario. That's a good little bit of pull.

The TB is 4600 curb weight. Most of the lifted ones all said and done, push 5000-5200. I was talking about my truck. I push 5200 pounds with a full tank before mods. After all my tools and extra stuff I carry, I'm probably 5500. Dave's F250 is 9150 pounds after all his stuff.

[HARDTRAILZ]

6000 would not surprise me for my truck.