Refinishing a bumper/ grill guard

[Bill]

After looking at the prices of new pickups here in Montana and getting knocked-over, I’m going to put some $ into my 01 RAM 2500. It’s been a great truck.

I’ve been looking for a used heavy duty front bumper since everybody in this area of Montana has hit the idiot whitetails on the highways, and elk and moose accidents happen. A family of 4 hit a moose north of here, killing 1 snd hospitalizing the other 3.

I found this bumper on Craigslist and met the seller at a Hone Depot. 2 1/2 hour drive north for me, same drive south for him.

Let the project start.

Picked it up today



Somehow got it into my garage sliding/ dragging it solo across wood blocks.



Looking a bit rough now.




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[pure lefty]

Interested Bill, I have an 88 bronco with a monstrosity of a grill guard that I wanna redo. Will be following closely.


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[Bill]

My plan is to:

- Bend/ hammer a few places back to original position
- Remove rust with flap grinder
- Prime
- Roll on 2 costs of black Herculiner
- Remove and Herculiner the chrome grill

There are 2, 7” x 3” rectangles for fog/ driving lights. I’d like to find flush mount led driving lights instead of mounting on the L brackets behind the bumper.

I may also put an led bar on it- and wire all the lights thru a relay to my high beams. That way when there’s an oncoming vehicle I can switch to low beams easily.

I’ll pay a local mechanic who does a lot of diesel trucks to mount it. I’ve got a pair of 2” front leveling ‘pucks’ and I’ll have Joe install them and replace the front shocks. I can hear my wife ready about the height.

To be continued.


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[TxHamJello]

Sounds like a fun project. Don't forget to post pics of the truck before the new bumper . . .

[Bill]

Originally Posted by TxHamJello

Sounds like a fun project. Don't forget to post pics of the truck before the new bumper . . .

Here it is. It’s the middle of the Montana winter. A new, shiny one with a heated steering wheel and seats would be nice.




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[KDinTX]

If you havent bought the roll on For the cost of the Herculiner you could get the raptor loner in spray cans and it would hold up better. The two times I’ve used herculiner it’s chipped and peeled after a couple of years, raptor liner on an old 4wheeler has been going strong for 5 yrs and get pressure washed often.

[Fajkus7]

I don’t know what that stuff cost or what it would cost to get it powder coated up there in the great white north, but I got my full replacement professionally stripped and powder coated for $250 down here and it looks awesome. It’s been holding up really well. Just a thought!

[Bill]

Both good ideas, thanks.


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[Grizzly1]

I’ve never had to good of luck with Herculiner. I’ve had Monstaliner on some items for 5+ years and it’s held up well…may check it out as well for your bed liner.

[Bill]

I put Herculiner in 2 pickup beds. The first had sone peeling in a high wear area. The second has not peeled or flaked at all.

I was at the local Napa and spoke with a fellow who works there, who’s helped me in the past. He said his experience is if the surface is prep’d correctly, it works well. Any grease or oil and it has problems.

I appreciate all the comments. I finished a repair on my cattle gate opener today, so the bumper should be next- subject to any honeydos.


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[Bill]

Got going on the project today. I realized the red was not rust- for the most part, but the red primer where the black paint had been worn/ scraped off. I used a brass wheel on a drill to clean that up and wiped down with Xylol/ xylene on a rag.

I got 1 good coat of Ace HW Rust Stop primer on the bumper. I’m not sure if a second can/coat will do anything for me. But I already bought it.

It looks better already.











There ain’t no sense in washing trucks here in the winter- it would look like this in a week or 2. The full moon is rising over the Tobacco Roots mountains.




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[Bill]

1 quart of Herculiner later.

Points to share:
- it stinks. My workshop was 47 and I kept a door open and the roll up 2’ up. If it were Texas-style heat it would have been ugly. Now I closed doors raised the heater to get it above 60 to help it dry. I’m sure it will stink in the morning.

- I tried using a texturing roller. Big mistake. As I rolled it sprayed black coating everywhere. I used an old bristle paint brush instead to get in corners and more dabbed it on.

- Keep stirring it so the crumbled tires or whatever give it texture stays in solution.

- it does thicken in the pan, I added a little xylene (xylol) to thin and stirred it up. Seemed to go on better.

- Xylene is great to clean up. I wore nitrile work gloves and it still got on my hands.

- 1 quart did the bumper, with a little left over. Herculiner recommends 2 coats for a bed liner, I’ll have to see how well 1 covered when it’s dry.








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[TxHamJello]

Turning out real nice

[Bill]

Thanks. 1 coat covered well. Since I’m not going to drag things on it like a truck bed, I think 1-coat is ok.

Next ordering some led combo spot/ wide area driving lights to mount while it’s still easy to get to the back.

What I want is for the lights to go on/off when my high beams are on/off, unlike fog lights connected with the low beams. I wonder if I can splice into a high beam wire to power, or splice into a relay and run a separate 12v and a deducated fuse.


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[marc.munoz31]

looks good

[BlackHogDown]

Lookin good.

[kruppa24]

nice work!

[kmack]

Originally Posted by Bill

Next ordering some led combo spot/ wide area driving lights to mount while it’s still easy to get to the back.

What I want is for the lights to go on/off when my high beams are on/off, unlike fog lights connected with the low beams. I wonder if I can splice into a high beam wire to power, or splice into a relay and run a separate 12v and a deducated fuse.

Bumper looks good!

As for the lights, when I run spot lights I connect them to the high beams like you mentioned. I use a relay for them. Main power for the spots comes straight from the battery and runs thru the relay to the lights. The trigger wire for the relay (to turn the spots on) is tapped into the high beam wire from one of the headlights. That way, every time your highs come on, so do your spots.

On my old Explorer, I also had a switch to kill the circuit, just in case I didn't want to blind someone when I turned on the high beams.

Something along these lines...

[Bill]

Thanks! That’s what I was thinking, being able to choose if driving lights were on or off when the high beams were on. I can’t think when I’d want high beams without the extra light, but it’s easy snd cheap to add.




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[Bill]

I’ve had luck with 2 led light bars I bought on amazon in the past. Looking at the 6x3” and 7x3” I can’t get over the reviews varying from great to junk.


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[davidpark06]

Looks good.

[Bucknaked]

Originally Posted by Bill

I’ve had luck with 2 led light bars I bought on amazon in the past. Looking at the 6x3” and 7x3” I can’t get over the reviews varying from great to junk.


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I’d purchase them before I purchased Rough Country junk!

[Mertzon Man]

Looks great Bill, nice work.

[Bill]

These came today, I’ll get them mounted in the cutouts.

I checked Montana law and learned I can legally wire them as ‘driving lights’ and tie them into the high beams aimed 1” down at 25’. As long as they’re 42” or less off pavement, they’re legal. Fog lights are 16-30” above pavement, tied to low beams and aimed 4” down at 25’. Above 42” they’re off road only lights. But’s here, I don’t know about the Texas Republic.




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[Bill]

Spending some time on it today. New Rancho 5000s are arriving tomorrow.

After thinking about how to mount the fog lights, I got 4 u-bolts. Drilled 8 holes in bumper, and used some doubled-up heater hose with tape wrapped as a cushion. Seems better than using the supplied bracket bolted to a steel bracket under the lights.

I figure once bumper is installed I can get sone horizontal adjustment using rubber shims. I still need to chop down the bolts and paint black.









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[Bill]

Well, part done. Scraped off metal film with a chisel (wear gloves- don’t ask me how I know the edges are really sharp), rough up plastic with sandpaper, sprayed with Duplicolor clear adhesion promoter primer ( for plastic body parts), then sprayed Duplicolor enamel flat black.



Still waiting for shocks. I’ve had these since I bought the topper in Cali for the move to Montana 3 years ago with bare necessities and the seller threw them in.




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[d_dial]

Looks good

[Bill]

On the trailer to the mechanic. He’s so busy I asked him to fix guys trucks who need them to earn a living and call me when he can schedule me in.

I brought my archery target out to shoot my bow. It feels great tp see arrows flying!




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[Bill]

When I was at the shop I met another customer. He recently hit a mulie driving over the pass coming here, then 15 minutes later had a whitetail jump in front of him close to where we are. Two deer strikes in 25 minutes.

You can tell the ‘locals’ around here. Posted speed is 70, out of towners go 80 and locals drive 50-60 because of whitetails. Lots of areas to pass us.

[Bill]

I had it installed plus leveling kit/ Rancho shocks.

I need to build something under the lights and across in front of the transmission radiator. I have a piece of fir from building the house which primed and Herculiner’s might work.

With the 2” leveling kit and the big bumper, I’m going to bolts a piece of steel on the bottom and make a step to climb up.






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[Texas Grown]

That kinda reminds me of the factory brush guard I had on my '67 D100 Short-n-narrow many years ago. Only a bit more heavy duty. I did a 2wd to lifted 4x4 on it. It was a tank when I got done!