Has anyone attempted making one?

I have a BUNCH of spare time at school in the welding shop, and the teacher already said its okay for me to make one. Im just wondering where i'd be able to attach it, and how heavy it can be.

I have an '88 toyota pickup, 4wheeldrive.

This is how I kind of want it to look like:


It looks like he used just sheet metal for the basic frame, and he said that the..
Center pipe is 2.5"
And headlight guard pipe is 1.25"

How heavy and how built can I make this before the weight gets too much?
And if anyone has built one, how much did it cost? I can probably find spare pipe around the ranch but I dont have a pipe bender, and going to a pro to bend it takes away the satisfaction of building it

 

well ive seen some pretty serious bumpers but the ARB is pretty heavy i think it weighs like 350 or so, and you can attach it to the stock bumper mounts if you take it off, or possibly the tow hook mounts

 

I just went driving around and found some pipes, but just lifting them makes me really doubt it will weight more than at most 200 pounds.

I also didnt know how much pipe benders cost, is there a cheaper way of bending?

 

sure, heat it up red hot and hit it with a hammer or hydraulic press.... but i dont reccomend that.

 

make sure you have lots of bracing in the end..
might look at other bumpers to get a general idea of where to go with it..

check out Badland Bumpers BASHER TUBE...its the strongest bumper i've ever seen...

its realllllly nice lookin too...

aint much around bending tube except with a bender..if you dont use a bender then it wont look very good..

 

That what one of my friends said, lol

We might just give it a try, I have a bunch of pipe perfect for trial and error

 

o ya..that BRUSHguard on the nissan..wont hold up to much more than....BRUSH..

when i do my bumper..im going to kinda copy Badland's design..but im going to have more plate..and it will be closer to an arb or TJM when im done..lol

and ALOT of bracing..

 

use a bending jig, ive seen people do it b4...you have a welding table, made out of like 3/8 steel sheeting, take your 1.25 pipeing and cut 2 peices 2" long flat weld them on the table however far down you need your bend, brace one end on one peice and bend the tube around the other piece using heat of course and good to go

 

or convince our shop teacher he REALLLLYYY needs a pipe bender

 

Haha very true! A 12 ton bender only costs about 150 bucks on ebay, bends up to 3" i think it said.

And a bending jig, kindof like this?


I guess I could weld another brace, i guess above the right one so the pipe doesnt move.

 

yup allmost exactly, i was thinking more along the lines of this, lmao dont laugh

 

Ah, lol i see now what you mean.

That will probably work well enough for what I need to do, thanks for the input!

 

sweet, or you can do compound bends like this...hope this stuff works for ya, TAKE LOTS OF PICS

 

The ARB bumper made of depleted uranium wouldn't weigh that much! I'd think it weighs around 100lbs.

To hold up against a deer, a bumper is going to have to me near-ARB strong. The ARB bumpers are made to hold up to hitting kangaroo originally, and they're about the same size as a smaller deer.

 

That compound bend might work better for the bends around the headlights, ill have to see what I can create in the shop.

Also matt, we wont be keeping this truck too long anyway(currently a senior in highschool and probably getting a new car soon) so Im not really worried about hitting a deer, its just deerguards/brushguards i guess would help me alot driving around the ranch. Pushing things and whatnot I just think that a deerguard would help me most in most situations, plus those stupid cows always getting in the way haha.