Would be nice to have those skills!! Or have a friend that has them
Rhino 4x4 Front Bumper (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter mcgaskins
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mcgaskins
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- Thread starter
- #82
Yes we went down the far side and then through the puddle that has built up. We actually took the super steep optional line to the far left, and my bro in law got it on his dashcam. This is the same part I'm actually referring to above with @JohnJB. Something that is interesting to note about the bumper is that I came down that steep line straight on, and as you can see in the video it's about as extreme as you can get in a 200 safely. The back wheels lifted off the ground momentarily, but it was all good with just letting some pressure off the brakes and easing it down. The amazing thing is the front bumper did not touch the ground anywhere! That shows how great the clearance is, and I legitimately think if it was a full bull bar or a bumper that protruded it likely would have pushed me to one side or the other as the back wheels came off the ground. Could have been a bit more dramatic without the Rhino bumper.
Side bar: it was this exact obstacle that made me decide to put a snorkel on my truck. I was in Moab in February during a lot of snow, and when I did the descent on the right, the first thing to make contact with the water was the front clip of the rental Jeep I was driving. It was a sketchy spot because there was really no way to back up/turn around since it was wet and snowy, and if the intake hit the water on the way down it could have been bad fast. The intake on the 200 is in a pretty precarious spot, so I did the snorkel right after.
I'm just glad there's no in cab footage since when I felt the back end lift I likely did something along the lines of
Greg did something similar to me on Fins that was down AND off camber, stuck a front tire into a hole on a descent. Brought one of the rear wheels up and as we teetered a couple times he graciously reminded me we were no where near going over... cus he KNOWS what that feels like. Oh ya, such consolation.
mcgaskins
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- Thread starter
- #84
tl;dr I have zero concerns about the strength of this bumper, and it's fully airbag compliant and crash tested.
The question of strength is a good one, and it's one I considered and was concerned about. I've almost always had ARB bull bars in the past with a few exceptions here and there like the aluminium CBI front on my Tacoma. Literally as soon as I saw the Rhino bumper however, I was not concerned any more about strength, mounting, quality, etc.
My family's safety is far more important to me than tire clearance, approach angle, looks, and everything else combined, so for me the first consideration was to buy something that has been crash tested and rated which severely limits the choices in the US. Australia is a great place to look because they have much stricter regulations on what's street legal, and Rhino is fully crash/airbag tested and compliant. We have some great custom options here in the US, but the shops don't have the resources or scale to go through the same level of testing. For me, it made perfect sense to look to Australian options for that reason alone.
Since I was able to install it myself, I got very familiar with the mounting system, thickness of the steel and general design. I am very impressed with how it bolts together, and there are redundancies built in to ensure it holds up. I was a little skeptical of the modular nature, but I prefer now as it allowed me to dial in the perfect amount of spacing between the body and the bumper everywhere. Since it's a full replacement bumper instead of the kind where you have to cut the stock bumper, the ability to align it just right is a huge plus, and you can adjust the left, center and right sections independently. It's more work on the front end without a doubt (pun intended), but 100% worth it.
After driving on the highway at high speeds, "crawling" on Hells Revenge and Poison Spider, wheeling on washboard and rough roads and everything in between, the bumper never moved, flexed, creaked, groaned, or did anything other than stay put. I marked all the mounting bolts with a paint pen, and none of the bolts have moved either which I will periodically recheck.
Like @RyanR stated, one of the biggest benefits of this design is that it simply doesn't hit anything (look at the video in post 82 above to see what I mean). With a huge bull bar up front like the ARB I had on my 14, I was dragging and hitting it quite a bit which I would presume causes fatigue and stress over time that lessens its ability to absorb impacts and might even cause frame damage eventually. We saw that happen already with the VPR bumper on the truck that was shipped to Mauritania, and the frame was cracked shortly thereafter because of a poor mounting solution. I've also seen some other bull bars cause cracking at the frame horns which you can find pretty easily with a google search (Mud results appear there too).
Edit adding pics:
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mcgaskins
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- Thread starter
- #86
They definitely have them for the earlier 200s that is a slightly different design than the one for the 16+. They have the same bumper for many different trucks as well, and it’s amazing to me how good the same basic design looks on all kinds of vehicles (kinda like ARB).
Looks great! What snorkel is that?
Saw this one and I prefer the one without a lightbar mount much cleaner look. Awesome build guys! Can’t wait to see more photos. Just got my new LC200 today and can’t wait to play with it.
Markuson
SILVER Star
Painted to match... Man...!...that thing really does look good. Like...factory...but not factory—bc factory is so unnecessarily low. Maybe Toyota should hire Rhino to do their bumpers as they *should* have been.
Very nice is an understatement.
mcgaskins
SILVER Star
- Thread starter
- #93
I personally like the hoop because without it virtually no one would have any clue it was aftermarket. Good news is the hoop is only held on by 2 bolts and can be removed in minutes, so changing it back and forth is easy.
Painted to match... Man...!...that thing really does look good. Like...factory...but not factory—bc factory is so unnecessarily low. Maybe Toyota should hire Rhino to do their bumpers as they *should* have been.
Very nice is an understatement.
Thanks! I have been very pleased with it and think it would be a perfect bumper for a TRD Pro + type of offering especially since it’s airbag compliant and crash tested. Although it is kinda fun to have something unique that no one else has in the US!
My Dad and my brother’s 200s. Thank God I saw the Rhino bumper before I got the one from ARB
@mcgaskins Looks like you are one of the few that will get these awesome looking LC200 bumpers in the US. I bought an LC200 this past Friday, found this post that evening, and placed an order Saturday. I received an email yesterday from Superior Engineering indicating that they will no longer ship internationally. Bummer! This is the best looking bumper for the LC200 out there. Hopefully, things will change on the customs issue, or a distributor will be able to broker their products internationally.
That sucks, have you seen the Rival bumpers they are similar to the Rhino...
DT-2D57011B Drivetech 4x4 Bumper by Rival-4
6mm Alloy Drivetech 4x4 Bumper by Rival - for the Landcruiser 200 Series
drivetech4x4.com.au
mcgaskins
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- Thread starter
- #98
FWIW it took us months to get the bumpers. Many emails, phone calls, waiting, etc. I think we started the process in December and the bumpers got here in March. Then we had to get them bead blasted to get the powder coat off, and then we had to find a good paint shop to spray the bumpers. It was worth it, but it was a lot of work and took a long time. Also since no shops had ever seen these bumpers, the couple I spoke to didn’t really have a strong desire to install them. That was ok because they were not too difficult to install with their modular nature. Of course if we had to do it again the install would take 20% as long as it did the first time around.
Sounds strange considering that customs is more about the importing country.
