Orange County CAF's: up to no good

Dude no shit? I didn't know you had a mobtown rear bumper on there. I heard their first one they made was horrible in terms of geo where it could barely open and had almost no distance from the hatch back with the swing out.

 

Haha I got a story somewhat similar to yours. So I was originally on the hunt for a front tube bumper and being on the sad east coast you know its slim pickings to find anything worth a shit to fit the bill. I asked mobtown and he said he was down to make it, but was slammed with orders...dude I waited around for like 6 months waiting for him to have availability.

I drove my truck to his shop which looked pretty rough to say it nicely although Im sure it fit their means. He recently had purchased a tube bender and was still getting acquainted with it...his design for this was to use his base plates and stuff that he uses for the plate bumper and then build a tubular like horizontal bar and all that. Well as he tacked on the horizontal bar it had about 6 separate angles in it where you could tell it had a octagonal look to it instead of a smooth curve which was already starting to look a little depressing. He got it where the horizontal bar was supported and ready to be built up, but needed to order a bunch of really small metal pieces to trim to fit and fill the gaps of the base portion.

I left the shop and over the course of the next two months slowly faded out until he pretty much said that he cant build the bumper. In essence I give the guy props for trying, but at that point I figured it was a bullet dodged as well and man it was the best thing that could have happened. What is sad is Im a mechanical engineer by profession and so is he. He claims that he "engineers" his stuff, when really I felt his whole approach to this process was a bullshit fabricator approach where he was just trying to fudge what he could because he didn't want to invest any time in a credible design process or possibly shape any new pieces. I know the guy is in the "lean manufacturing" mode where he will only invest in something if it can make a return on the investment instead of a one-off project which was partly his interest in it. It would be one thing if I wasn't an engineer, but to claim that your approach as a fabricator is an "engineered approach" is to me reaching pretty damn far when lets be honest I could probably have designed my bumper if I had the 3d renders that he paid Toyota to have for the second gen front end.

This almost inspired me to look into a bender and look into what I could actually design although at the end of the day I would have no credible measurements to rely on without really taking my front apart to a degree to get my criticals.

Anyway to conclude, I had his set of three skids since I got them when he was having a sale on the old design...after this I swapped out the skids so he has no products on my truck. I have come close a few times to buy the tailgate reinforcement piece cause that mod does have merit.

 

So with all of that said, did you download "War Robots" yet???

 

Jeez man there are credible issues and then the self destruction as you describe. I assume you must have continued your communication for a little bit with them after delivery of the rear bumper? What kills me man is I really feel that he "eyeballs" a lot of stuff and it looks like a good fit on paper, but nothing is actually tested prior to creation. I laugh at how many folks are dedicated to them as they brag they are expertly designed and blah blah blah, but in reality outside of what a CAD box can show...he has no idea how they will really fair out in the field.

Going back to the first set of skids I had...I think he redesigned them partially cause guys were dinging the hell out of them at Rausch from the NJ/NY guys who had his skids. This caused his second design of skids to have added reinforcement gussets and all that which is a nice change, but could have been incorporated the first time around. I had his quarter inch skids so they survived IMO strictly due to the material thickness as I was worried without reinforcement up front that getting the traditional 3/16 would dent as I came to see in my buddies skids who had the same design skids I had in 3/16.

Im not too familiar with BAMF's design process, but I get the vibe he has a process of how he tests his stuff and gets to a certain point before he is willing to release to the public. Mobtown's idea was to phase out the 1/4 inch skids cause people complained they weigh too much and likely affected his sales, while BAMF will only sell 1/4 inch cause he doesn't believe in inferior thickness from what I have seen. Granted, the demographic of the east Im sure plays quite a toll of what is popular compared to what is functional as folks up here all the time want aluminum tin can skids cause they add bling but would deform like a mofo on trail should they ever get relied upon. I think you can see the difference in mentalities among just these two companies. Because of this...its hard for me to accept that any of their armor could be safe for "loading" as I remember back when I first started modding my truck that my buddy had bought their 3rd gen sliders. They didn't have the measurement right and so his slider rests on the pinch welds up front by the front tires...mobtown tried to justify initially that the pinchweld can be a strong point to design from. This is true if the fabricator actually designed it this way, but at some point the sales joe confirmed that they made a big batch (50+ sliders) with incorrect dimensions after the fact.

 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA I KNEW THIS WAS COMING!

Fuck it Im gonna search that shit right MEOW!

 

I’m just curious, I don’t have a bone in this discussion, I just like useful information.

The only manufacturers I know that sell 1/4” skids are BAMF and apparently Mobtown used to? Mobtown is the only manufacturer that I am aware that has gussets on the inside of the skid. It seems you’re calling his product inferior when in reality EVERY OTHER manufacturer produces a 3/16” skid w/o reinforcement. I understand what you’re referring to when comparing them to 1/4”, specifically in difficult rock trails, but that’s really not the industry standard so what makes his product so inferior?

Again, I’m only asking because Mobtown skids caught my attention due to those gussets as opposed to every else’s product.

 

Support local - or at least in same state - fab shops.

 

Does Eric @RelentlessFab still make bash plates? I have a complete set of his - closest to me - that are beef. Drag the truck over stuff all the time without issue.

 

I would have to look it up, but Mobtown was not the first guy to make reinforcement gussets on their stuff. My main grip was my buddy dinged the shit out of his skid within an hour on the first day rock crawling with the 3/16 skid to where it was a bitch to get it off and back on later cause of the deformation. I guess maybe all skids die that quick? Regardless, I think if mobtown knew it could fail that fast they would have tried to incorporate something maybe a little sooner...but hey man who knows right?

 

CBI on order

 

but aren't they sexy!!!

 

Sure? You sound like a tree hugging 3rd gen owner... oh wait.

 

That’s mean..... reported!

 

Haha...I downloaded it!