- Joined
- Feb 26, 2003
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- Sherwood Park, Alberta
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The last big project on my diesel converted FJ60 is a custom made, rear bumper, rear tire carrier and front bumper.
When I first got into cruisers ten years ago I made my bumpers and tire carrier with limited welding knowledge, that being said, nothing ever failed.
Well now I have a lot more experience and I wanted to try and make some really nice stuff to suit my clean FJ.
I looked at many rear bumper designs here on MUD as well as all over the net for quite a long time. I guess I kind of went with a hybrid of a few designs. I wanted to make it my own
At the same time I am getting the tire carrier going, I am using a comp4x4 heavy duty spindle. I will be chopping up my old tire carrier and reusing the steel from that.
The bolts are all 1/2 inch grade 8.
The fun began with removing the stock bumper brackets. I ground down each rivet until flush with bracket and then hammered each one out with a punch and big hammer.
After making several templates out of cardboard I finally cut out two bumper mounts using 1/4 inch steel plate. In order to fit the 1/2 inch bolts I took a 1/2 drill bit and just enlarged the holes a bit, took a minute to do all 6.
Most of the steel I used I did not even have to cut the widths! I got it from a local metal supermarket and it was already in the widths I needed. Except for the small vertical piece which I had sheared at a local shop, well when I got it home I had mismeaured so I just cut it by hand anyways
The following pictures are from my first day working on it, as you can see I tapered in the ends
When I first got into cruisers ten years ago I made my bumpers and tire carrier with limited welding knowledge, that being said, nothing ever failed.
Well now I have a lot more experience and I wanted to try and make some really nice stuff to suit my clean FJ.
I looked at many rear bumper designs here on MUD as well as all over the net for quite a long time. I guess I kind of went with a hybrid of a few designs. I wanted to make it my own
At the same time I am getting the tire carrier going, I am using a comp4x4 heavy duty spindle. I will be chopping up my old tire carrier and reusing the steel from that.
The bolts are all 1/2 inch grade 8.
The fun began with removing the stock bumper brackets. I ground down each rivet until flush with bracket and then hammered each one out with a punch and big hammer.
After making several templates out of cardboard I finally cut out two bumper mounts using 1/4 inch steel plate. In order to fit the 1/2 inch bolts I took a 1/2 drill bit and just enlarged the holes a bit, took a minute to do all 6.
Most of the steel I used I did not even have to cut the widths! I got it from a local metal supermarket and it was already in the widths I needed. Except for the small vertical piece which I had sheared at a local shop, well when I got it home I had mismeaured so I just cut it by hand anyways
The following pictures are from my first day working on it, as you can see I tapered in the ends
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