God Bless the Rains

Had a couple months of unexpected travel but I am home now until departure. Thanks to the guys up at OK4WD out of NJ, most everything is ordered, with a couple of exceptions, and should be able to pick it all up / get started putting it all together just after Thanksgiving.

 

Also, I'm on the board of a missionary in Kenya near the border of Uganda and we got him a Hi-Lux, in less than a year he has had two broken springs, one bad front wheel bearing, broken 4 wheel drive switch, and is ready for new tires! It's a stretch to call what he drives on roads!

 

Glad to see an update

 

From Rocky Roads website -

Rocky Road's Tacoma Rock Sliders are the creme' de la creme' of the rocker protection world. We use 3/16" inner hitch steel to make sure your bars do NOT bend! Anything other than hitch steel is just plain flimsy.

Most other Tacoma rock sliders are made from thin 1/8" wall tube material. Alot of shops refer to these as Nerf bars. an appropriate name since they will offer about as much protection to your vehicle as a Nerf toy product would.

A good number of the Tacoma Rock Sliders we sell are to those who have actually bought these thinner bars and have bent them up. Even slick looking dual tube designs that appear to offer better protection are still only made from 1/8" steel and will bend on a hard impact.

Our Tacoma Rock Sliders have a very sleek rounded look about them as we use genuine inner hitch steel in their construction. Hitch steel is not only very strong, it also has a nice radius corner instead of a hard boxy look. Inner hitch steel is the stuff you use to plug into 2" receiver hitches. Its sheer weight is astronomical as is its bending strength. Our shop press goes to 50 tons and we can't even start to bend them. Do you think a scrawny little rock can hurt these things? Think again!

 

I read this when I made that post.

• What exactly is "hitch steel?" My comment was referring to that statement specifically. Hitch steel doesn't mean anything to me. DOM or HREW (for tubing) at least provides some description.
• The comment about comparing sliders to nerf bars is total nonsense - nonsense enough for me to discredit the company for saying that.
• (My understanding is that) They mount by drilling multiple welds along the pinch seam on the body - not exactly bolt on or reversible and I fail to see how it would be stronger than clamping/bolting on to the frame like @Mobtown Offroad for example (from an engineering perspective, from what I've seen these would probably be the strongest bolt on design on the market).

OA

 

"Hitch steel" is just a term used. It's actually just the chemical level of the mill process for the carbon tubing. Hitch steel is A500 carbon steel which has a higher dent resistance than what most sliders are made from which is usually a lesser grade. With that being said, we too use A500 carbon steel tubing, or what some people call "hitch steel". We just don't advertise it because no one is really going to care. Most people only care if the round tubing is HREW or DOM.

 

Thanks for the clarification. A500 I understand (civil engineer); it’s the most common spec I’ve seen for HSS sections so I’d expect it to be common among off road fab companies as well.

OA

 

Yup. No one really advertises it because its the most common steel out there. From all the vendors on this forum, I bet they all use it.

Really, with sliders the type of steel is the least of your worries. You should focus on key engineering fundamentals. Look for long, unsupported lengths or "moment arms" which are typically at the back. We have a cantelivered tube gusset that ties in the back leg and the moment arm to minimalize deflection. Look at how the slider is bolted to the chassis. Is it a flat plate (weakest), does it bend under the chassis grabbing more bolts (stonger), does it wrap the chassis to box it in (strongest, we are the only ones doing this), does it require drilling (lots of sliders do for full use, states it in the fine print). Do the gussets go the full length of the legs, where are they placed? To the side of the tube is strongest, gusset should run length of leg for minimal defection, again we do both. How many legs are there from the attachment plate to the main tube. Are the legs and main tube square or round, square is stronger which is why we do square. What hardware is supplied, grade 5 or 8? If it's not 8, throw it away and go buy grade 8, again we include all grade 8.

Anyways, everyone has their own opinions. Not everyone is going to go bounce on rocks all the time so they don't feel they need the strongest set out there. But I'd rather have the strongest set for the what ifs and peace of mind, especially since we are about the same price as all the other sliders.

We went at this product with an engineering mindset of a goal of being the strongest 100% bolt on rock slider on the market.

 

Anything new happening here?

 

I'm guessing not.