Cutting fender questions

Just started cutting my fenders (front right now) for clearance and was wondering if cutting or bending the inner support along the spot weld will be nesc. I'm running a RE 4.5" with 32's. I don't think I need to do this. I've had the front stuffed real good and don't believe this area will come in contanct with the tire. By 'inner support' I mean the fender area of the unibody....

You might not need to depending on your wheels and offset. however, I would bend it over with a hammer rather than find out on a nice tire that it does just touch enought to cut it.

Michael

Yep...decided to just knock em over with a no.5 lip bending tool. I did notice that there was some slight rubbing going on prior. Thanks for your time!!!

bend it! Start at one end and do one run down bending it a bit.. then come back and take another pass bending it more and so on..... Don't bend it all on one run

Kejtar

Kejtar, I've been meaning to ask about your sig, and rig... "well trimmed fenders" - I've seen pics but not close up (looks good from what I've seen) and, more importantly, got a write-up?

ok..... let me think back.....
ok, so I started with stock (untrimmed) fenders and while running 31's I'd rub a bit here and there when compressing.... so I trimmed a little here and a little there upfront. The end result was that while on a trail I compressed on the passenger side and turn and pulled the fender in GRRRRRR So I got home and I trimmed the hell out of that fender so that it wouldn't rub. The plan was to still reuse the stock flares just redo the bracket, but I overdid it a bit... so here come TJ flares to the rescue with help of Ed Stevens .

One fine Sunny day I stop by Ed's house where with his help the fenders get trimmed. The most important step is to plan things out first:
1. Take the stock flares off
2. Take the bumper ends off
3. Take the TJ flare (if that's what you're planning to use) and hold it against the fender. Better yet, put it up and have someone hold it for you while you step back to examine the look.

Then after marking it with a pencil or something (try to stay away from sharpies...) plan the trimming. The best thing for you to do is to trim a little bit less and then bend it up. THe bend isn't simple. Ed had a really good set of pliers (something for body work which had a wide flat set of jaws specifiaclly for metal bending) and bend up. You might have to make incisions in certain spots for the bend to make it, but try to do that as little as you can (you want the longest pieces possilbe so that they reinforce the fender).

After that you hold the flare against the fender and adjust (snip here, snip tehre, bend here and there). Oh... when I was doing that, I had to remove my drivers side washer bottle (it sits in the fender) so that I had room to work with it.... I will move it into the engine compartment... eventually LOL.

Anyways, after all was said and done I redid the inside fender lining so that I wouldn't get as much crap thrown towards the door, and I took a BFH to that lip inside the front fender and after couple passes I had it tucked against the body like it didn't even exist......

Now to finish things off, I masked off the fender in the shape of the flare (just a bit more) and I used the herculiner in spray can to finish things off. Then I took the tape off (don't wait tooo long for that... pretty much take the tape off as soon as you finish spraying) and I let things dry and put the flares on.... that's all folks Let me know if you have any questions

Kejtar
P.S. I trimmed the bumper endpieces so that they were in line with the flare

Thanks for the info, that helps a lot! Jump This, I hope it helps you too, I certainly didn't mean to threadjack... thanks again!

Kejtar said:

.... that's all folks Let me know if you have any questions

Click to expand...

Do you have any pics of that process or the finished product? That sounds great.

I thought I posted the link to the "after" in any case, check this out: http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?m=63978128303.54432057903&n=209973853

Kejtar
P.S. Don't have the photos of before as my photes have taken my camera hostage and ran away with it to Alaska for close to 2 months LOL

Thats impresseive. Did you do front and rear or just rear? Ant did you bolt the flares straight onto the bumper or did you use some kind of backing? Again looks good!

Flares went right onto the bumper with bolts and nuts. Of course I used big washers on the inside and somewhat smaller on the flare side.

The rear has for now stock flares which are trimmed as well as a fender which is somewhat cut and folded. SInce I don't rub there at the moment, I'm leaving it be till I get some better ideas later.

Kejtar