A friend of mine owed me a favor and he just removed these Warn Rockers off of his 90 something YJ. With a very tight budget and not a lot of aftermarket products out there that I liked for FJ40 rocker protection, I decided that I could see if I can make the Warn Rockers work for me. I forgot to take a picture of the factory rocker on the Cruiser but I do have an old picture of where I started after purchasing the Cruiser to get an idea about how much I cut off.
The first thing I had to do was remove the factory step. Then I had to draw a line 2 5/8” up from the bottom of the rocker. This would be level with the lowest body mount and give me a good place to rest the bottom of the Warn Rockers against. I also decided that I would be going with larger tires soon and that the wheel wells now will be vulnerable. I cut out the bottom of the fenders at an angle that I thought would work for me.
I actually just kept using a ruler until I found a good angle then mocked that up with a piece of cardboard so I could transfer the angle to the passenger side.
So with a cutting disk on my angle grinder I started to hack into my body.
Here you can see a picture of the stock Warn Rockers.
The next step was to put the uncut Warns up against the body so that I could find out where to begin modifying them.
I found that the front angle of the Warns almost matched the angle of the front fender, but it was a little off. So I took my square and matched the fender angle. I cut from the top portion on the rocker down so that I wouldn’t loose the overall length but I did now match the Cruisers body lines.
To stay within the Cruiser body lines, the rear of the Rockers had to be cut and bent to match. I did not cut all the way through them, just enough to bend them.
The bent rockers now needed to be welded up so that they are just as strong as they were originally.
Once I had the outside cut and measured to fit. I still needed to do something about the door opening as with the rockers, the doors would not be able to open by about three inches.
(for reference)
I used a jack to hold the rockers in place and used some white grease and a model paintbrush to mark out the line for cutting the door openings.
Once that was done, I matched the lines on the other rockers and cut away with a few disks and sawzal blades
With my fingers crossed, and no way to fix an error since I cut out portions of the Warn Rockers I did my test fit.
Perfect fit. The only thing I need to do was trim the rear wheel well just a bit
I measured the difference between the original holes on the rockers and found that I could use two new holes 15’s apart to mount to the lower cruiser body.
After that was done I drilled my holes while waiting for the paint to dry on the rockers. Be careful when drilling the holes in the tub. Make sure they are high enough to clear the floor-boards.
Here is the final product before making mud flaps for the trimmed front fenders.
The final step was to use some thick rubber for mud flaps. I actually took off my rear flaps and used them in front. Rivets are used to attach the new mud flaps.
The final completed picture
All in all I am happy with the new rockers and I have about 3 inches of additional clearance from the nasties.
I have more pictures, but I cannot have more than 20 per post. Sorry about that.
The first thing I had to do was remove the factory step. Then I had to draw a line 2 5/8” up from the bottom of the rocker. This would be level with the lowest body mount and give me a good place to rest the bottom of the Warn Rockers against. I also decided that I would be going with larger tires soon and that the wheel wells now will be vulnerable. I cut out the bottom of the fenders at an angle that I thought would work for me.
I actually just kept using a ruler until I found a good angle then mocked that up with a piece of cardboard so I could transfer the angle to the passenger side.
So with a cutting disk on my angle grinder I started to hack into my body.
Here you can see a picture of the stock Warn Rockers.
The next step was to put the uncut Warns up against the body so that I could find out where to begin modifying them.
I found that the front angle of the Warns almost matched the angle of the front fender, but it was a little off. So I took my square and matched the fender angle. I cut from the top portion on the rocker down so that I wouldn’t loose the overall length but I did now match the Cruisers body lines.
To stay within the Cruiser body lines, the rear of the Rockers had to be cut and bent to match. I did not cut all the way through them, just enough to bend them.
The bent rockers now needed to be welded up so that they are just as strong as they were originally.
Once I had the outside cut and measured to fit. I still needed to do something about the door opening as with the rockers, the doors would not be able to open by about three inches.
I used a jack to hold the rockers in place and used some white grease and a model paintbrush to mark out the line for cutting the door openings.
Once that was done, I matched the lines on the other rockers and cut away with a few disks and sawzal blades
With my fingers crossed, and no way to fix an error since I cut out portions of the Warn Rockers I did my test fit.
Perfect fit. The only thing I need to do was trim the rear wheel well just a bit
I measured the difference between the original holes on the rockers and found that I could use two new holes 15’s apart to mount to the lower cruiser body.
After that was done I drilled my holes while waiting for the paint to dry on the rockers. Be careful when drilling the holes in the tub. Make sure they are high enough to clear the floor-boards.
Here is the final product before making mud flaps for the trimmed front fenders.
The final step was to use some thick rubber for mud flaps. I actually took off my rear flaps and used them in front. Rivets are used to attach the new mud flaps.
The final completed picture
All in all I am happy with the new rockers and I have about 3 inches of additional clearance from the nasties.
I have more pictures, but I cannot have more than 20 per post. Sorry about that.
