Homemade skid plates?

3/16"

 

Where do you guys buy the blank sheets from? a 2x4ft 3/16 steel sheet from McMaster is over $300, it's almost more expensive than buying ready-made skids.

 

You in Jersey? Check out Fazzios. Place is awesome.

http://www.shopjfi.com/

 

I just went to local metal distribution company. 50 bucks for the 3/16 sheet

 

These guys have a store 15 min away from work, time to start designing.

https://www.metalsupermarkets.com/

 

I'm pretty lucky as I have a buddy with a fab shop so I get material at cost.

 

My next mod after my bed rack.
Thanks for all the info.

 

So I'm thinking of doing this, I have a pretty well stocked home shop Miller TIG, MIG, and Plasma, w/ spool gun. I also live near fazzio's in jersey. Any reason i shouldn't be strongly considering making these out of 304 Stainless? If i'm going to spend all that time fabricating......

 

Just curious why stainless?

 

Depends on why you want skids. Are you actually planning to do much off-roading? No point in going stainless if you're going to beat them up.

 

Was thinking the same thing.

 

A couple reasons. I think it would be a superior material overall for this application. Wont have to worry much about corrosion, my truck is brand new and I plan on owning it a long time. Also it has a significantly higher yield strength. A-36 steel is around 250 MPa and stainless (depends slightly on variant), but is over 500 MPa, which is similar to Grade 8 Steel hardware. Basically, you can expect the stainless to deflect slightly less under load and scratch significantly less when stressed. I'm thinking this means you can definitely get away with 3/16 stainless plates which eases fabrication significantly, and still walk away with a skid plate stronger than 1/4" A36, although both materials are definitely adequate for the application. I would say long time salt corrosion resistance is the best reason to use aluminum or stainless vs steel.

Plus I like to think outside the box, and haven't yet gotten married so i can spend my money on something as ridiculous as stainless steel skid plates. Materials for Stainless should still come in much less than purchasing the steel plates, it is not that crazy expensive.

 

And to answer the other part, my hope is that my plates never take damage. I am intending to use the truck to travel some and camp. But i like the idea of protecting things in the event of a boulder....... if it were to happen.

 

@Tacodriver08 Stainless???

 

Stainless seems like overkill. Aluminum with a lightweight tubular steel structure would be a nice blend of light weight, corrosion resistant skids.

 

I'm surprised everyone thinks stainless is overkill. If I could pay Toyota the material difference between mild steel and stainless steel for the truck frame and body, and get a truck that was built with all stainless, I would do that in a second. It would probably be a like a 2-3K up charge to never have to worry about significant corrosion in the body and frame. I figure I can at least cover my sensitive parts in stainless steel.

I have no supporters for stainless steel skids? And before I get crucified my guess at the stainless steel up charge is probably high. Even if Toyota pays triple price of current stainless steel scrap rates (~$.15 /lb) for their bulk stainless steel, its only 1000$ at most in metal. Fabrication is most of the cost.

 

Stainless will work great for skids, but for a truck frame it has trouble with stress cracking at welds and things.

Chevrolet made some cars out of stainless back in the 60's for European embassy cars. A friend of mine owned a used one it basically fell apart due to cracks around bolts and welds.

 

Stress cracking in stainless is a problem for sure. So is corrosion at weld seams especially with salt based contaminants, the metallurgy of weld actually can differ significantly from the rest of the plate.. These are definitely things the brilliant engineers at Toyota could overcome with different grades of stainless and different manufacturing techniques, at least I think and hope they could..... Stainless frame would be awesome, definitely tougher to accomplish though... glad someone likes my stainless skids idea finally.

 

I definitely am not saying that I don't like the idea at all. I've tried to come up with many different materials for skids.

I think steel is just the goto as it is an in between point for strength and cost. Plus more people can work with that material then the others.

 

There is a guy on here that sells stainless skids for first gens and since most leave them bare metal I was always curious to see how they would look beaten up. I say go for it. Which fazzios are you near? Glassboro? Stop by and say hi in the njbs thread. Lots of dudes in there are home grown amateur fabricators working on different shit for our trucks.