Sliders, Steps, and Car Doors

After doing a good bit of searching, and a lot of reading (most of it old...), I can't find anything definitive about defeating (reducing) car door dings to the side of my truck.

I just purchased a 2014, and would like to keep it looking new as long as possible. I'd love to say that my new truck will live most of it's 4x4 life on dirt, but it's realistically going to be on pavement and parking lots more than anything else.

Some posts I see suggest that sliders are the best option, others say that sliders with a 2" lift are needed, others suggest any sort of steps, and yet a fairly large percentage say I'm basically fucked.

I'm looking to Brandon's Avid Off Road offerings for both a light bar and sliders.

What's the good word?

 

IMO sliders are the way to go, if you have them delivered disassembled and have the person that installs them assemble them you can set how tall the kick up of the slider is in (closer in to the body, or sticking out from the body).

If you need a good budget option for sliders then 4x innovations is where i'd look.

 

This is like asking what type of girl to date - hahaha

It will all come down to personal preference.

 

Oh. That's not exactly what I was expecting.

 

I will have to say, this was my goal in 2008 when I bought mine. As of today, I have 1 tiny door ding. The best advice I can give you is either park next to other Tacomas or park in the back of the parking lot and get some good walking shoes.

 

I have Avid's bolt on sliders. Look like sliders, mount like running boards. They offer some protection, but won't take the weight of the truck like sliders will. Good for the occasional stump or log off road, and don't hang as low as steps. As you can see in the picture, they stick pretty far out, an inch or so past the furthest point of the door. Luckily I have not had to test them yet in the real world, but I don't see why they wouldn't stop most car doors. In fact, I did open a buddy's door up to them to see if it would stop before the door, and it had 1/2-1 in clearance when it hit the slider. Due to their height, shopping carts would be a different problem . . .

 

That's what I've done so far, but I'd like a bit more insurance.

Edit:

Thank you! That's great.