Input: ARB Side Armor Plates (1 Viewer)

[Nay]

It needs to be braced back to the frame from the wing. Otherwise, creating too much rigidity out on the side wing will create a nice lever arm, and instead of bending the bumper you may well bend the frame.

I'm not saying there isn't a middle ground in terms of beefing it up to avoid some minor cosmetic damage, but the real support from the side will only come by bracing it back to the frame, which is difficult to do on an 80, unfortunately.

Nay

 

[Dusty]

Nay
More on your bended frame comment. When I look at the frontmost part of the frame rales (the parts the bumper bolts to) it appears they are seperate pieces welded to the rest of the frame rales behind them. These frame extensions arn't even welded all the way around. I would think that if you torqued the end of the bumper hard enough you might bend these welded on frame extensions before the rest of bumper bends-doing so would smash your fenders/lights but the rest of frame and radiator support etc would be ok.

I would be curious to know if others have used a highlift jack on their arb/custom bumpers to lift the front of their trucks from the sides of the bumper. Surely many have landed on rocks where the outer edges of the bumper mommentarily held the front of truck

When I built my bumper I tried to mock up supports from the bumper edges to frame and decided it wasn't possible without using up space in tire well or seriously modifying the radiator supports that are in front of the tires. I did place multiple gussets with the hope that the bumper would hold if I jacked from the sides of the bumper. I havn't had the guts to try it

 

[TiredIronGRB]

I have some side (wing) damage right now that these would have prevented.

 

[MLX450]

That plate/brace also looks good mounted on the outside (welded and painted)