Attn Plate Bumper Owners, help getting mounted correctly

The front end of the grill dips down too low and won't allow me to get the Elite plate bumper mounted up correctly.



The grill is dipping down enough I can't get the bumper tilted up correctly so it butts up flat against the frame ends.

Couple of options I see:
1. New body mounts up front or add washers.
2. Add washers to the mount point underneath the frame
3. Sand down the bottom of the grill
4. some combination of 1-3.

Anybody have a similar problem and find a good solution?

 

I installed poly body mounts, they brought it up a little bit taller than sagged rubber ones.

 

It might be the camera angle, but it sure looks like the "grill dip" is normal and the rear of the bumper is bent up. In your sig pic there is a huge gap at the bumper end/fender. The top plane of the bumper should be straight/flat. Lay a straight edge on it.

 

The grill does dip down below the line of the nose of the cab. Not sure why toyota changed it from the earlier models where it was a continuous flat surface. That be the reason I'm thinking of taking a sander to it.

 

I had the same problem a couple months ago when I installed my Elite bumper. What I did was to get the two front pointing bolts on first while having a strong buddy hold the bumper level'ish. Then while having him 'rock the bumper around I lined up the rest of the bolts to get them loosely on. Now here's the part to cure the same issue that you are having. Those 'wing' bracket mounts were the first ones I tightened down first since that it was allowed me to secured the bumper in place so that it didn't rub on the grill. Those 'wing' mounts will allow you to adjust the tilt of the bumper as well as up/down. After that you can tighten up the other ones.

Now one part I did screw up was not shimming those front two bolts. I'll worry about those later...

 

And if you watch the frame tweak, you may want that - I have seen many fenders and flares get chomped by bumpers.

 

Was your strong buddy's name Jack? I think I may enlist his help as well.

This sounds like a good plan of attack. I'll give it a try before the winch so I can see if it works out. Very appreciated.

 

With the amount of hell I had with installing mine I never want to remove/install it again. Good luck; I hope you get it installed smoothly.

 

Thanks. The hardest part is the two end cap bolts. Relentless' bolting scheme seems much easier to work with.

 

Hmmm. How many attachment points are on the elite bumpers? I didn't think it was that big of a deal to install one. Hope I don't have any big issues with my bruteforce bumper.

 

6 points, with 4 of those points using 2 bolts ea.

The hard part is the frame rail end caps, 1 bolt each for left and right rails. Access to them is through a couple 3" holes in the front of the bumper. I found you can get a socket on them with a couple of extensions and a u-joint.

The rest is all easy peasy.

I'll get pictures of the mount points posted later today.

 

I just redid those two rail cap bolts on my truck this morning. Instead of using the factory bolts like I did the first time, I swapped them for grade 10.9 M12-1.25x30mm bolts and shimmed them with a grade 8 washer. This time I realized that instead of using a 17mm 3/8 drive socket attached to a 3/8 swivel socked and a 10 inch 3/8 extension, there is an easier way!

The new bolts I used had 19mm heads, but I was able to used a short 19mm socket attached to a pivoting 3/8 drive ratchet. The trick is to have the ratchet handle (preferably 10 inches long) upright and facing the side of the vehicle so that one of your hands can hold the socket on the bolt head while reaching through the interior fog light holes while your other hand works the ratchet handle from the outside.

I hope this makes sense; if not, let me know and I'll try to give a better explanation.