Aftermarket bumpers for trucks

[LittleLebowski]

Is the agreed upon best practice to hit a deer first with your factory bumper and then use the proceeds to buy a nice steel aftermarket bumper?

[Suvorov]

Is the agreed upon best practice to hit a deer first with your factory bumper and then use the proceeds to buy a nice steel aftermarket bumper?

That’s been my plan, but in my case it will likely be that I get hit by a Tesla.

[mtnbkr]

That was my method.

To speed things up a bit, drive up and down I66 at night during mating season.

Chris

[wvincent]

Been down this road. We used to have a policy of replacing all factory bumpers with Ranch Hands upon purchase of a vehicle.
Turns out, any vehicle that had a replacement bumper still suffered a few thousand dollars worth of damage when hitting deer.

So, considering the cost of having to buy the replacement bumper, it just wasn't worth it.

Now, I'm not an engineer, but I think that putting on that steel bumper is affecting your crumple zones, areas meant to fail, to absorb the impact and lessen some of the shock to the vehicle inhabitants. Also, I have to wonder if that steel bumper doesn't make you more dangerous if you hit another vehicle.

[HCM]

Is the agreed upon best practice to hit a deer first with your factory bumper and then use the proceeds to buy a nice steel aftermarket bumper?

Thats what I did but you may get some grill and headlight damage that way.

Ranch Hand is the local solution: https://www.ranchhand.com/

[Lester Polfus]

Been down this road. We used to have a policy of replacing all factory bumpers with Ranch Hands upon purchase of a vehicle.
Turns out, any vehicle that had a replacement bumper still suffered a few thousand dollars worth of damage when hitting deer.

So, considering the cost of having to buy the replacement bumper, it just wasn't worth it.

Now, I'm not an engineer, but I think that putting on that steel bumper is affecting your crumple zones, areas meant to fail, to absorb the impact and lessen some of the shock to the vehicle inhabitants. Also, I have to wonder if that steel bumper doesn't make you more dangerous if you hit another vehicle.

That right there.

We're still in the Fitting Out stage of the new truck, and I've been deep diving into overloading, off roading, etc.

First we have a $500 deductible, so spending $1K on a new bumper to maybe save the insurance company some money doesn't make sense.

Second, if you ask a Ford engineer "Hey if I bolt this bumper onto my truck, what does it do to the crash safety/crumple zones, etc?," the answer will likely be "Dunno. But if you want to spend $1 million on crash testing, somebody can tell you."

Intuitively, it would seem like a big ol' hunk of steel would be helpful, but with crumple zones and such being carefully designed, it isn't necessarily true that changing a major variable will be a good thing.

I take excellent care of my vehicles and try to make them last a long time, but when it comes to crashes, I regard them as disposable. Hopefully my family will be sitting in a crumpled up beer can saying "Wow! All this crash safety stuff really works!" My preference for any vehicle that takes a major hit is that it get totaled so we can start afresh, rather than deal with the lingering bullshit that happens even after a "good" bodyshop tries to fix it.

ARB has crash tested their bumpers I guess, but I'm fuzzy on whether that's with Australian vehicles or US.

Finally, over the lifetime of the vehicle, what does the big ass steel bumper cost you in MPG, tire wear etc?

They do look hella cool though.

[Bratch]

They do look hella cool though.

CDI

Does anything else matter?

[HCM]

Been down this road. We used to have a policy of replacing all factory bumpers with Ranch Hands upon purchase of a vehicle.
Turns out, any vehicle that had a replacement bumper still suffered a few thousand dollars worth of damage when hitting deer.

So, considering the cost of having to buy the replacement bumper, it just wasn't worth it.

Now, I'm not an engineer, but I think that putting on that steel bumper is affecting your crumple zones, areas meant to fail, to absorb the impact and lessen some of the shock to the vehicle inhabitants. Also, I have to wonder if that steel bumper doesn't make you more dangerous if you hit another vehicle.

Were y'all using the diamond plate bumper or the one with the Schedule 40 pipe ? IME / Observation you need the pipe version if you want to avoid damage hitting a deer anywhere near highway speed.

Re: Making you more dangerous, that is unfortunate in an accident, but a very useful option in other situations.

[wvincent]

Were y'all using the diamond plate bumper or the one with the Schedule 40 pipe ? IME / Observation you need the pipe version if you want to avoid damage hitting a deer anywhere near highway speed.
Pipe. Problem is, everything around it like the plate, uprights, and smaller tubing will get trashed. Also, they rust rather quickly. This is on a 2016, been on there since purchase.



Re: Making you more dangerous, that is unfortunate in an accident, but a very useful option in other situations.

True, but, paying the odds, I'm more likely to win a weekend in Vegas with Eva Lovia than I am to have to engage someone with my pickup. And even if I do have to use my pickup as a weapon or tool in a force situation, the damage it sustains will probably be the least of my worries. Cause I'm one of those "normal Earth Folks" that Bolke teaches to, and you ain't. If I was doing your job, my needs would be much different.

[Lester Polfus]

True, but, paying the odds, I'm more likely to win a weekend in Vegas with Eva Lovia than I am to have to engage someone with my pickup. And even if I do have to use my pickup as a weapon or tool in a force situation, the damage it sustains will probably be the least of my worries. Cause I'm one of those "normal Earth Folks" that Bolke teaches to, and you ain't. If I was doing your job, my needs would be much different.

This. If I'm "engaging" with my F150, it's disposable then too.