NEW BUMPER IRON BULL front and rear..

So many of you know of the out of control issues I had with ADD and lets say its a dead horse for now and have to wait and see what ADD does in the future. Enough on that...

SO my current search for a bumper brought me searching for front and rear matching, winch for both, light mounts, size, looks and overall how much of a beating did it look like it could take.. I searched a ton, either did not get responses or blew me off as not interested.. It came right down to 3 in a hurry. In the end I went with Iron bull bumpers. Cameron answers his own phone, does not have the best people skills but will try to hook you up with anything you want. Now going in I knew these were going to be heavy. I weighed stock bumpers coming off and going on and will have numbers later. Overall impression of the bumpers, wholly crap, delivered by one of there own trucks. He tows a flat bed trailer around with about 50 or so bumpers and goes out to make deliveries.. If its not right, its not some shipping company to argue with. The bad they said he would call before arriving but called from the driveway, not a problem just be aware. First impressions, this is how you ship bumpers. No scratches, all the brackets you need and its ready to bolt up. The bad the light holes are round so Dually D 2 can not be re-used. So figure your going to buy lights also..

So far the rear on the front partially on... Here is a picture also showing the stealth fighter rear and its lack of side protection. More and more companies are lacking side protection. More to come..

08/4/13 Fronts on now figuring out all the wiring... If anyone else goes this route I have things I have learned I will catch up with that in a few days. Missed the south Tahoe run for doing this, time well spent I could hit a cow to a Camry with this and bet it only gets a scratch... It weighs a ton though, I will give more weight information soon, also how it affects driving...

08/07/13 Wiring new lights 900.00, two winches 1200.00 new backup lights 100.00 , 500 amp relay for the two winches 90.00, making everything work priceless... Getting close looking forward to long term drive to get the feel for everything. Yes for those that have asked 141 pounds is the weight of the front bumper unpacked on the scale by itself, and yes I have a scale in the garage now...

08/25/13 Its the weekend and its time for this rumble to begin.... See next post for my review... Here we go....

Now where to begin, many of you know of the fun I had with the supplier that will remain ever more to me as the dreaded 3 letter word. I have read on this forum that if you order a bumper it will come to you with some powder coat marring and possible scratches. It is the nature of shipping and that's how they will all show up just live with it accept it and know its coming that way. I began my search for two bumpers front and rear to replace my factory bumper in the front and get a matching rear bumper since my factory rear did not make the first outing. (see lost coast run). Now having just finally gotten my new rear bumper why in the world would I change it? It was in at least as good a shape as it had arrived to me in. But since there was no way I was going to use the 3 letter word to match my front and rear, I jumped at the chance to take a 400.00 loss and get a matching set... (Extreme sarcasm ).. So since the three letter seller was not going to make things right had no interest in returning my calls I was off to find new front and rear...

I searched a good while looking for bumpers to fit the lines of the truck as well as be durable, hold a winch, and have light mount tabs. My search took me to RPG, (not the bad 3 letter word I say that cause the RPG folks are pretty nice guys) Fab fours, Iron Bull, Smitty built, Warn, Hefty fab works, Tough country, Over the Top custom bumpers... After looking at pictures and calling a few I came to notice a peculiar thing about several. They look so much alike they looked like they were made by the same guy. After narrowing down which bumper and then asking for some cost info warranty etc. I finally settled on Iron Bull, as the one to try out. I ordered it up and Cameron said about 3 weeks then shipping I said ok lets get it done. He was happy to take my credit card info over the phone and take my order. So a new front and rear would be on the way. How exciting is this new bumpers front and rear and my wife was not having a fit at the 3k plus payout. So I found a buyer for the rear bumper I had and swapped it out and back to the factory for a few weeks.... So now I get excited like a kid waiting for Christmas and new toys. So my impatience got to me so exactly after 3 weeks I called and Cameron says were on schedule. When the driver of the trucking company gets to about 3 hours away he will call you. Well ok, so far better than my last bumper anyway. So I wait and think about 10 to 14 days shipping from them to me. So were sitting at the house the following Saturday (4 days later) and the door bell rings and I see a truck with a massive trailer and wonder dude your lost. He says I have two bumpers to drop off, I was like what? At this point dazed and confused I stagger outside starring at the huge trailer trying to digest his words. He asks where do you want them at? Then it was like a light turning on wholly crap the bumpers are here already. I looked at him and tried to fumble the buttons on the garage door to open. I told him right here is great.. So we off load the first one, broke my spleen I think and he tells me that was the light one. I looked at him kind of scared I guess cause he said right away I have a dolly to get the other one on just help me get it off the trailer. He fumbles around for the dolly and realizes he left it at the last drop, so I told him I have a flat dolly to put it on and my wife ran and grabbed it. So we finally wrangle the dam thing in to the garage and he snaps up a water my wife offered and off he went. There was no Trucking company it was a Iron Bull delivery driver in there truck hauling about 50 bumpers out for delivery.

At this point I want to get at the bumpers and check out the finish and start on the wrapping materials. It was plastic wrapped, card board, plastic wrap about 6 layers or so. Low and behold my new rear bumper, perfect finish line-x type but heavier and tougher like alligator skin. Good clean welds nice light openings and sturdy looking clevis mounts. So I throw it on my garage scale to get an idea of the weight 80 pounds no winch. The winch mount is built in to it and requires the feed out the bottom of the winch. So time to uncover the front bumper and like the rear I think they go to every grocery store for 20 miles and take empty cardboard boxes because this thing comes wrapped. No scuffs and no problems and everything looking beefy and indestructible. Throw it on the scale and 141 pounds of front battering ram.

So my first challenge is get them on the truck, lol yea like that's going to just happen. So I think it through and realize that installing the winches has to be the first priority since those will go easier before the bumper is bolted to the truck. Get them on finally and get to looking at them and it really is a simple installation. The rear bumper has the mounting plate already on it so you just unbolt the entire rear bumper receiver hitch and all 6 bolts total and re-use the factory nuts and bolts. SO with two helpers holding up the bumper I popped the factory hardware on the rear and it was on. Now to make the gap look right we used a jack to raise it to the top of the holes and close the gap between the tailgate and bumper as close as we could get it. I will say it would be nice if they included installation directions, would probably make things easier. For some reason no directions and when I asked about them Cameron said there pretty straight forward... He was right but still directions are nice to have.

Front bumper its a bitch trying to line holes up on a bumper that's 200 pounds with winch and again you re-use factory nuts and bolts. It is designed around them being re-used and its a PITA to get a small hand in to one of the holes if you don't use the factory hardware, since I had no directions guess how I know what a PITA it is. So after removing the new hardware I bought and installing the factory hardware it bolted on really easy. Again using a jack to raise it up and get it in to place and line up both sides.. Of course there is a detail that I have left off so far and that's having to trim the fender flares to fit. But before that you have to remove the lower factory valance and hood latch assembly. Directions, directions, directions... So far every bumper I have ever bought did not come with directions why is making directions so hard... In part it would also be nice if they would send a trim template with the bumper, they all have to be about the same so a trim template would have given them an A for installation ease...

Overall first impression is these things will eat almost anything they come in contact with and being line-x easy to repair and paint. These are really what a bumper should aspire to be and strength is so far off the charts. You could easily go out and knock down small trees and the occasional large tree. They really are very well built and this would be my choice of bumpers in an accident, not to come in contact with.

Driving and the added weight and effect on handling etc. It is noticeable and knowing full well going in the weight would be a factor in any kind of cornering. It did smooth out the overall ride and comfort in the front suspension. It added just enough weight to really make the front suspension really work better. If you corner hard it wants to plow in the corner now more so than before, but this aint your daddy's sports car. Its a truck in the truest sense of the word. Looks good all the time and so far anyone that slices and dices in traffic in front of me takes one look in their rear view and switch lanes out from in front of me. It takes the looks of the Raptor one step more menacing by the reactions of the other drivers. So far my longest drives with it on are about 30 to 45 miles. My fuel mileage has not changed significantly on the freeway maybe at the most .25 MPG at freeway speeds. I was getting right around 13.5 MPG before I installed it and still about the same..

If I had it to do over, yes I would and the looks I get driving it around tells me it is noticeable enough to get attention while driving. The reaction of other drivers getting the hell out of my way..... priceless...

If you decide to go with these let me know I will make you a template for your cutting of the flares. It will make cutting your flares much easier and not having to pickup the 200 pound bumper to test fit it over and over... also priceless....

It looks like it fits snug to the body. IT also looks like it is lineXed.

Looks good and solid. I also like the texture -- makes it more off-road looking.

Looks like the dirt wall will be scared of you on the next lost coast run. Looks good buddy.

Looking forward to seeing pictures of the front bumper.

Thats a sweet rear bumper. I only wish it had a larger step area in the center. I look forward to seeing the front one installed...

I think another forum member has that front bumper and it looks badass.

Strong looking bumpers.

What winch mounting plate are you going with in the front?

What are the tabs hanging down in the rear?

Looking forward to seeing the front finished up.

Yukon Joe
GLRE Support Raptor
WWW.RUNRAPTORRUN.COM

Hi Joe, the tabs in the rear are for Back up sensors, Iron bull did not know only the 2013 have this option. So there on there, I would have asked for no backup but I can grind those two of pretty easy. There are actually two more holes in the bumper I have ordered lights to fill those two.... It should look ok when I get done adjusting... These have the winch plate built in to the bumper so you don't have to do anything but bolt in the winch...

Icecobra said:

Hi Joe, the tabs in the rear are for Back up sensors, Iron bull did not know only the 2013 have this option. So there on there, I would have asked for no backup but I can grind those two of pretty easy. There are actually two more holes in the bumper I have ordered lights to fill those two.... It should look ok when I get done adjusting... These have the winch plate built in to the bumper so you don't have to do anything but bolt in the winch...

Click to expand...

Eh... good deal. It was hard to tell in the photos.

Winch selection??

Yukon Joe
GLRE Support Raptor
WWW.RUNRAPTORRUN.COM