NickMiller

Not at the moment! Still have to order my d-ring shackles and figure out my trailer hitch situation. Progress will be soon though!

89pickup-pablo

Copy that. Thanks Im hoping to do a bumper very similar to yours. Looks awesome so far

Redeth005

Hey Nick. Just a little tip. Like you I also had in mind to do my own hitch. But after many hours of thinking, brainstorming, and research I decuded to keep the original toyota hitch. I chose to do this because I already know that the stock hitch is already rated for towing. Andbif I were to make my own (wich I'm sure would have came out clean) I still wouldn't know the towing capacity I would be able to tow. Let alone know if my hitch would hold up. So I kept the stock hitch and just made a small knotch where the square tow receiver is.


I actually welded my bumper around the squard tube on both the front and back side. And that just accounted for extra support if I was to ever get rear ended.
You can see in the picture below where I welded mine.


The best part about doing it this way is that you can rest assured that your truck will be able to still handle towing what you used to before making your own bumper.

Mine came out extremely solid. And I tested the hell out of this thing in the last trip to Big Bear with my neighbors and Chefyota4x4. After about 25+ hits to the back I'd say it was safe to assume yhe bumper wouldn't have any problems at all holding up lol.

Here's some more views. Incase u want ideas.



Anyway let us know what route you decide to go. I'm waiting anxiously.

Redeth005

Btw I thought u could use some ideas of how to mount the bumper to the tow package. The 2 tubes in the center were welded to the front face of that hitch. They weren't very long. Plus around the trailer hitch receiver too. And well the sides were done on mine because I went with the extra side protection all the way to the wheel well. So I needed the support on the sides as well to avoid rocks or boulders from pushing my bumper into the bottom of my truck causing body damage.




Sides welded to the frame.




And 2 tubes to that hitch


Sorry for all the pix not tryibg to hijack the thread or anything. I just thought you might be able to use a 2nd opinion. I tried to copy the same mounting ideas off the 4x innovations bumper that Chefyota4x4 had. And that made it really solid.

Anyway good luck man. Look forward to see how u go about this.

NickMiller

Thanks for the tips! When I first was looking at options I had read through your thread and had seen what you did. I agree with you 100% that using the factory hitch would be the best solution, but with the way this bumper is designed it just looks dumb leaving the factory hitch hanging so low. Mocked it up and took some pics today to show you what I mean. They kinda suck because my phone settings changed and I didn't notice until afterwards... -_-

As you can see the factory hitch hangs REALLY low. (Yes, this is the ONLY rust on this truck)




What I'm looking at doing is what Zelephant did with his rear bumper build. Looks pretty good to me!

Redeth005

Holy crap what a rust bucket. Dude you should really fix that hunk of junk up. Clean all that rust up. Dang.... lol jk
Ohh I totally understand what you mean now. I see why u wanna go the other route. Yea good luck dude. I wanna see what u cone out with. I know its easier said then done from thinking this over personally but would it be toi hard to raise the hitch? Cut the backets and re weld them together at a higher spot, and weld on reinforcement plates? I dunno. Hey btw how thick is the wall thickness on that bumper you're making?

NickMiller

I'm gonna try to see if I can make the stock hitch work before I go spending more money if I don't have to! Shouldn't be too hard!

It's .120 (approx 1/8") wall box tubing. Not the strongest stuff in the world, but it'll be more then enough for me!

RAD4Runner

Agree with you, Nick, on hitch being too low- you lose your departure angle. It's because bumper was designed with hitch in mind as an add-on, and hitch was designed so it's plug n play around the existing stock bumper. IF I were to design my own hitch I'd do like Zelephant did. Hopefully, the receiver opening would allow access to spare tire hoist mechanism (putting jack handle extension rod through).
It would be nicer however, if there were a way to make receiver a little recessed, but then there would be no room for the lock-pin.

NickMiller

I don't plan on using the stock spare mount anyways, when I get a full size spare it'll hang down too low and I'd have a sucky departure angle again. How far the receiver will have to stick out kinda bugs me, but it's not THAT bad! I'm gonna get it as close as possible!

RAD4Runner

oh yeah, and when you have the swing-out carrier, then the receiver sticking out would not matter anymore.

NickMiller

No plan for a swing-out carrier at the moment... Don't really like the look of 'em unless you have a matching wheel & tire to mount on 'em! haha!

ChefYota4x4

iTrader: (5)

Excited to see it!

Toyota~Boy

iTrader: (2)

Here's my bumper hitch design

Kinda what your going for right

85sr5excab

More food for thought

RAD4Runner

Nice! That's a hard-working Yota!

85sr5excab

Haha thanks. It doesn't work to hard yet but someday if I ever get it done it'll be a workhorse lol.

NickMiller

Well a few things have come up and the bumper has been put on hold... Been busy in class working on a boat trailer for a local guy and last week the 'ol 4Runner blew a head gasket! The bumper will get finished, but getting her back on the road is priority #1!!

ChefYota4x4

iTrader: (5)

Grrrrrr! Lol.... Jk, my best to ya!