DIY: Increase Approach Angle with Modified Skid and Bumper

I thought I would create this thread to better document one of the more unique things I've done. It's all in my build thread, but wanted it to be more easily searchable and consolidated for future readers to stumble upon.

What I did was cut off the factory cross-member that my IFS skid mounts to and move it higher, creating more clearance and a better approach angle offroad. Then I built a bumper to pair with that. Here is a sketch of what I will gain.









Here is the angle of my skidplate before any modification. For reference, I have a Mobtown Offroad skid which is reinforced 3/16" steel.








My idea was to reuse the part I cut out, but it was too deep and interfered with the radiator. So I chose to use some 2" square tube, .120 wall. I moved the cross-member as high as I could, while still being ~1/2" below the radiator. I didn't want to put the skid too close to it and risk damaging it.













In this pic, the skid plate is totally bolted up, not sagging at all. So that's how much of a difference there is, approx 4".








Next up was to modify my skid plate. I cut off the front of it, and built a new piece out of 1/4" steel.

















Here is my clearance behind it. Plenty of room and I didn't have to modify anything.








I used rivnuts for my skid plate mounting points. I thought about doing something stronger, but the rivnuts themselves really aren't seeing much force at all. They're just clamping the skidplate to the cross-member, and the cross-member will be taking all the force in a hit.











Here is a good visual comparison of stock vs mine.

















Now that the skid plate portion is done, it's time to build a new bumper. All off the shelf bumpers are designed around a stock truck, so they go down as low as the stock cross-member, so obviously those would not work for me. I have no experience working with round tube, so I used the funds from selling my old bumper to purchase a tube bender. I just jumped right in.

The idea was to get the winch as high and tight as possible, while still looking good. Function over form in this case though. I wanted the winch tray to be as beefy as possible, and then any tube coming off that would just be aesthetics pretty much.


1/4" mounting plate, .120 wall dom tube, and 1/4" winch plate, with 1/4" gussets.






















Now that that's done, get started on all the tube work.













Added some 1/8" plate to the center to clean up the look and also to house the fairlead
















Then finally, I added some Baja Designs pods to the top, and a bar to protect them. The bar is about 1/2" in front of the lights so I don't need to worry about bumping into a tree.











Grand total weight of the bumper is 82 pounds without lights or winch. With, about 125-130. Overall a very light combination. And here's the bumper in action. I've done this obstacle before and had to stack rocks about a foot away, because my bumper would ram into the rock. Not anymore!!

 

Pretty damn awesome

 

Nice work! At first I was like WTF is going on here and then the story got better.

 

Great work! I thoroughly enjoyed all the pics and details.

 

Nice write up.

I'll be curious how that welded joint on the leading edge of the skid holds up. Mine has a number of big dents there, and I'd be worried about cracks in the weld.

 

The lower joint? I'd be pretty surprised if it cracks but time will tell. At least if it does, it's a super easy fix.

 

Yes, between the angled section and the flat bottom.

If it survives on your truck for a year then it's a good design and making custom skid plates just got a shitload easier

 

I'll also add I've done a couple of moderate winch pulls on my first trip out and the bumper was rock solid. I'm very confident in its strength after that and have no doubt that the line will snap or something before my bumper catastrophically fails.

 

Nice!!

 

So much ingenuity here. Thanks for showing the process!!! Wicked tight. I can’t wait to have my front frame dangle chopped off when I get around to front bumper time.

“OFF WITH YE FRAME DANGLES!!!”

 

That last pic is bad ass

 

Thanks, one of my fave! Here’s a video of me going over the ledge.

https://youtu.be/kvfL0oRoAjg

 

Nice progress pictures. All I can think about is all the places I could access with a truck like yours. Places that only ATV's would venture. I could get to some awesome fishing spots. Anyway, that's a hardcore build! I should really have a dedicated off-roading truck if I'd ever plan to do something like that.

 

Looks nice my friend, that's on my list of things to do one day. One recommendation would be to replace the stock bumper mounting hardware and beef up the stock sheet metal that your bumper is bolted to. It'll only be a matter of time before that will crack from fatigue of the weight of the bumper and winching. Toyota has designed that stock aluminum crash bar mount for taking hits, but not for tensile load from recovery or winching.


I even put a gusset in between the inner ear mount and frame to keep those tabs from bending (hopefully)

 

I had considered that, but also why I added the braces that grab a hole further back on the frame as well as the two mounting points that grab underneath the crossbar. I had a similar set up on my old bumper and it held up great to a bunch of winching. On the plus side, if it does fail, I have the tools to fix it and it’s not too difficult.

 

I was shocked, that even with that braces supplied from the bumper vendor, I still had cracks. Hopefully yours holds up, just keep an eye on those bolts, it was a day and night difference when I rebuilt mine. Glad people are finally growing the sack to cut up their truck a bit more and not buying the bolt on specials

 

More like wayyyy too much time on my hands and zero fucks to give I figure after bobbing the bed, anything else is child’s play. (At least anything I’m capable of)

 

hahah, yeah I hear ya. Once you start messing with a welder, plasma, and tube bender, it really opens up what you can hack up and modify on these pigs, especially working from home during a quarantine.

 

Nice work. This kind of diy stuff is so satisfying and often better than 3rd party/off the shelf for less cost if your don't mind the time it takes to do. I'm just starting v2.0 of a RTT rack, myself.

What tubing bender did you get and what's the capacity, if you don't mind me asking.

Thanks for sharing.

 

I have a JMR manual bender that I converted to hydraulic with a bracket from swag off-road. I’ve been happy with it so far. Between the bender, die, and the conversion I have about $1k into it.