The damage caused by our earlier off-road trip has forced the issue. At the LRO Show in Peterborough the other weekend I finally selected one I liked. After a lot of back and forth I selected the Torque Performance (TP4x4) one. That is the same make as the front bumper I have.
One of the reasons I liked it was because it looked easy to fit. The other bumpers available used two of the towbar bolts but this one uses two spare holes near the existing bumper mounts.
The people on the stand did mention that it needed some body work cutting to finish the job but a bit more on that towards the end.
Removing the existing bumper is easy. I won't repeat myself too much as the removal details are shown on my post about fitting a tow bar.
In summary:
- Remove the rear bumper lights
- Disconnect the light and reversing sensor cabling
- Undo two bolts
The old bumper should now be off.
I then tidied up the now redundant reversing sensor connector with a bit of tape and cable ties.
With the TP4x4 bumper the plastic sill cover is not used. The new bumper overlaps the chassis and does not need and will not fit with the cover in place.
This is held in with trim clips which need to have the centres pushed through and the clips pulled out of the body.
With that out of the way the bumper can be bolted in. But STOP!
If you want to fit towbar electrics to the inset mounting on the bumper do that BEFORE fitting the bumper. Once the bumper is on the car you cannot get behind to get the towbar socket bolted in! Guess how I found that out!
Back to fitting the bumper.
There are two spacers one either side. The bolt passes through the bumper, through one of the bolt holes in a spacer and in to the original threaded bumper mounting hole. I spray painted the bolt heads black to match the bumper before fitting.
Attach both of the bolts in to the threaded holes first but do not tighten. You need a little bit of free play to get the other bolts through their holes. Fix those with the washer and nut.
Tighten them all up. I assumed a torque setting of 45Nm as per the original bumper bolts. This very slightly indented the metal so perhaps a little less torque might be better.
[Update: see my newer post in September 2016 where I make my own spacers that I think work better.]
Connect up the lights and clip them back in and the bumper is on and ready to go.
As you can see from the photo, the line of the bodywork does not meet up with the bumper. My intention was to do as the person from Torque Performance had suggested and trim the body work back to the wheel arch in line with the bumper.
So far I have not done that. The step looks fine and the only thing I think it needs is some form of plastic end cap to finish off the trim. If you don't have a towbar then trimming the rear panel will give you a better departure angle but it will make little difference for me. I may still trim it but at the moment I am happy with the result.
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Update September 2016: The powder coat had fallen off and the bumpers rusting so I have cleaned them up and coated in U-POL Raptor load bed liner.
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