How important is armor underneath?

Mobtown

 

Peace of mind is definitely what I’ve been thinking about. Every time I scrape I get scared haha

 

My truck with the Sliders, front skid installed and pic of the tyranny skid before installed. I need to take a picture of the tranny skid installed. With both skids it covers everything back to the low hanging exhaust pipe. I plan to reroute/lift that low pipe and add the flat diff skid to complete the skid set. Some add a fuel tank skid also but doubt I will.

 

Looks good. I’ve been looking at RCI

 

I bought the whole package for the 4th of July special by RCI. Waiting on a few more plates. They are steel so they are gonna bring my mpg’s way down for sure.

 

I ended up buying mine during the 4th sale as well, but I bought aluminum. I’m happy, but apparently my exhaust hangs down lower than normal and was close enough to the plate to vibrate against it. I called RCI and they said it is a know issue because Toyota isn’t very precise with the exhaust hanger weld. They sent me more spacers at no extra charge, but they alternatively suggested I use rubber hose clamps on the rubber isolators to lift the exhaust off the plate.

I ended up using the clamps to lift up the exhaust, but it makes me wish I had done an exhaust reroute before I bought the plate.

 

Skids, sliders and a hi lift or winch should be top priority when modding a truck to go wheeling really anywhere. With that combo you should be able to get out of almost anything and won't damage the important parts under your truck.

 

if you plan on doing anything beyond moderate difficulty trails, you want armor. Just did the Rubicon and I wish I had a little bit more armor for sure.

 

I did a lot of reading when I began to build my new truck. Here are some suggestions for what to do, in order, based on years of trial and error building an adventure vehicle. I hope you will find it helpful.

Start from the ground up.
- The first thing that contacts the ground is your tires. Get good tires that fit your needs.
- Carry a compressor to air down. A 12V one is fine, or onboard air if you can afford it.
- Buy a set of traction boards and recovery ropes/shackles and carry them with you.
- Do the exhaust reroute. I still don't know why Toyota left that exhaust pipe down so low like that.
- Skids and rock rails next. Choose what is cost effective, don't worry about materials.
- Do the rear diff breather mod for in case you encounter a deep hole or a water crossing.
- Suspension/lift components. The tires you started with don't need to be the same size as when you are lifted. Note that lift does not instantly mean you can run bigger tires; there are other factors involved here.
- Front bumper and a winch. They are best done at the same time to save the effort of removing the bumper later.
- Rear bumper. It could have a hitch mount in it, tire carrier attachment, and be designed to increase departure angles.
- Roof rack, bed rack, RTT, hammer hangers, bigger leaf pack, ecgs bushing, differential gears, tpms guards, lights, etc etc.

And from here the list can really be endless, there is so much we can do to these trucks!

 

I think you will be surprised! Yes the weight does impact MPG, however not as much as you may think. We didn't notice a ton of MPG issues when installing all of the RCI full plates and sliders.

What did impact MPG was the roof rack and accessories we put on.

Our trucks are not fuel efficient at all. Soooooo once you start adding stuff on them you will notice a hit.

 

Seems to be the most important upgrade in terms of potential future cost savings. Waiting on my BAMF skids now and hopefully will see years of benefit from them

 

Most important piece of armor I've bought is a Talon Cat Converter Anti-Theft Plate to keep the asshole tweekers - or just average thieving turd - from sawing them off.

 

An added benefit of armor is protecting your catalytic converters from theft.