Custom Bumpers...

[AkJeepKid]

So I saw a few custom bumpers that some of you have made, I have even pm'd a few of you recently. But how many other users have custom bumpers? I'm leaning more toward the self febricated rather than pre-fabbed.

I have 0 experience in welding and working with metals. But I wanna learn so bad. For now I'm just fishing for ideas until my XJ isn't my DD or the sun finally comes out and its not cold out anymore. Whichever comes first.

Thanks in advance for all your input.

Robert:wave1:

 

[ChuckD]

Keep searching for ideas in the picture forum, usually there is somebody in there building a bumper once a week.

Only have two suggestions, pay attention to the mounting points and make sure your welds have deep penetration.

 

[fubar XJ]

If you plan on fabbing anything signifigant, you need a few things first: A clean, dry, heated shop space. A metal cutting bandsaw or sawzall. A drill press or stout hand drill. A bench grinder or Makita. A decent welder (mine's a 220 mig, a 110 stick will work for most things) and most of all, the ability to use all of the above. Nothing will suck the life out of your projects, not to mention compromise their function and/or safety, like lousy welds and poor craftsmanship.

It takes time to get that stuff together. Enroll in a welding course at a local community college or tech school in the meanwhile so you can learn.

 

[English XJ]

Practice/learn your welding! It makes a massive difference between doing several crumby welds and having to grind in-between compared to just making one pass and knowing it's all good.

Either enrol in a local course or get a book, read it and spend a weekend practising. It takes longer to be really good but that should get you started.

Being inside and comfortable helps, being not rushed for time helps too but that's not saying any of us have never done it. Best advice would definitely be to take your time and not be afraid of adjusting the design later on.

Take a look through the picture thread too, get a selection of ideas. I personally like the minimum ground clearance / maximun approach angle types.

 

[Tim_MN]

Here is a start, these are your heavy duty mounting brackets. Click on the link and down load this page to your computer and save it.
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Heavy duty bumper brackets

 

[HeavyMetal]

heres mine we did, we used those exact plans above for the brackets

 

[AJsArmor]

A lot of good advice. Read, read, read, research, research, research and listen. Don't be a rush, take your time and learn as much as you can. Take a few welding classes to get the basics down then when you do get a welder, practice like crazy before ever building your bumper.

When you're designing your bumper, do not equated thicker with stronger and build a boat anchor of a bumper. You can use thinner materials and gain a lot of strength from the design. Good luck and have fun with it!

 

[Stumpalump]

I bought a Lincoln Arc welder at Sam's club years ago. I read the 19 page booklet that came with it and I was an instant welder! Or should I say I could get metal to stick to each other. Lincoln and others have some good online info but all the basics are covered in the book that came with it. I still don't consider myself a welder or fabricator but I've gotten some stuff built that even impressed me. For my XJ bumpers I kinda cheated by buying Nates 4x4 rear bumper brackets and a Detours off road backbone for the front and built off of it. I started years ago with a new welder and a loose trailer fender bracket and have loved working with metal ever since. Get a 4 1/2" angle grinder and a welder for starters and you will be a hobbiest fabricator/welder in no time. It's really nice to help out freinds and neibors with it to because they will love you for it and you will love to weld!

 

[AkJeepKid]

Wow guys n gals, thanks for the input. I'll definately read up on it. I will prob try and take a summer class on welding, I have to look and see if our college offers it. Im prob not in the position to buy one right now, but my family friends of ours has one and im sure he would be nice enough to cough it up for a few weeks.

Once again thanks for the useful info

 

[TMXONR]

Here is a link to my build. It used to be on this site too, but when the Pic fourm was purged it went bye bye.

http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=330323

http://s22.photobucket.com/albums/b346/TMXONR/Jeep/?action=view&current=DSC02493.jpg

 

[Tazjig]

Here are the bumpers i made, using the same mounts as above. If you are goin to do this then you WILL need a drill press, your not going to want to be drillin like 10 1/2" holes through 3.8's or 1/2" steel with a hand drill. But mine took me about 2 days per bumper.

 

[chris420]

Just do it ! thats what I did. Here is a list of things you will need to build rock rails and bumpers from squar tubing.

1. Welder Arc or Mig
2. 4.5" grinder ( with cut off wheels and sanding wheels )
3. Bench Grinder
4. Vice
5. Drill Press or a nice electric drill not a charge able drill.
6. Transfer punch set
7. 120 pc drill bit set with metric and standard sizes up to 1/2 inch
8. Drill bit set from 1/2 inch to 2 inch
9. rulers, angle finder, square edge, level
10. scribe, pencils, markers
11. sledge hammer you never know when you might need that
All these tools can be bought at Harbor Frieght for a great price. Good Luck

 

[Steve F]

Here's a list of what I had when I built my front and rear bumpers and rockrails etc.

140AMP 240v Stick welder (240v is the standard power supply here in Aus)
Hand drill
4.5" Grinder
rulers pens pencil etc.

It's tougher without the drill press etc but certainly possible.

Cheers
Steve

 

[jdbwrx]

A few more things to think about:

-A flat, sturdy work surface
-C-clamps
-Files

I don't know if it was mentioned, but having a chop saw helped HUGE for cutting tubing.

It almost seems stupid to say, but safety gear. Gloves, safety glasses, and some sort of dust mask. The first night after working on my bumper I was blowing gray snot all night!