Body armor advice

Hi everyone.
Ive stepped up my off-road experience a bit this year and it's time for a few upgrades, and I'm looking at armor. Went out wheeling yesterday for over some dips and definitely kissed the ground several times. It was my most technical outing yet
Ive got a 2020 OR, and I'd say that I'm probably looking at moderate trails and useage. I'm not looking at doing extreme rock climbing, but lots of mud, trails, ruts, dips, hills...you know, that kind of stuff.
I haven't lifted my truck, I will later on, but I'd rather get this out of the way first.
Front bumper first and then rock sliders, and I've already got those figured out, but it's the skid plates I'm curious on.
Moneys a bit tight, so it'll be a work in progress, a little bit here and there so my 2 questions are...
Which skid plates are absolutely essential to begin with?
Aluminum or steel for my needs?
This is also my daily driver so I need that balance of protection vs weight and gas mileage

 

Put a 2x4 under the accelerator pedal.

 

Aluminum is probably a good fit for your usecase, but it is more expensive so take that into account. I'd start with just the front skid, I have coverage all the way to the t-case and honestly the front is the one that sees the most hits. RCI makes a good set that integrate nicely together and you can add them one at a time. A word of advice if you go that direction though is spend the money and time to get an exhaust reroute first so that the rear skid plate can be flat, I get hung up a lot there.

 

I would do the sliders and at least the engine skid plate before the bumper. The transmission skid plate is fairly inexpensive and may be a consideration at the same time as the engine skid. Look around for used as well, you can get some great deals, I was able to purchase a DV8 Offroad steel engine skid for $50.

 

Agree with this order, sliders then skids, then bumper. I have full aluminum skids, yes the have taken hits and work well. I went with aluminum to mitigate weight and because I don’t intend to bash my truck into the terrain. A comment, if you will eventually get a full set of skids pick a single vendor now. Otherwise you’ll probably have interference when you add the other skids.

 

+1 to this. On my 2020 TRD-PR build, I did sliders, skids, and bumpers. That's the proper order of progression (IMHO). Also, I did have steel full skids on my 2010 Tacoma and switched to aluminum on my 2020. No regrets, they've taken hits well, and are hella easier to be removed for maintenance.

 

The TRD aluminum front skid plate provides protection at the alignment tabs. The RCI front skid doesn't. Thus I went with the TRD front plate, RCI transmission and transfer case skids, all aluminum. I enlarged the front mounting slots of the RCI transmission plate so that the TRD plate can be mounted flushed with it, lessened the clearance loss.

 

Skids and sliders first. Steel (3/16) not aluminum. Only used the winch (and thus bumper) a few times. This past year I had to winch up to a flat spot so I could turn around. This was while “he who will not be named” was pointing to the map saying “it says its a blue trail”. That “blue” trail had dragons teeth that would have stopped Rommel.

 

Thanks. Will definitely go this route

 

Great advice!

 

i would say rock sliders always first. After for skid plates, since you already have a steel one in front can take some hits, i would say definitely go for a transmission skid plate next. RCI is my go to on that.