Crash Bars!!

[Extreme01]

Well I spent most of the day Saturday cutting and trying to remove crash bars. Was able to get passenger side done after about 15-20 blades. Will be taking it to my buddies shop to do drivers side. I never dealt with a steel this tough. Must be some kind of hardened steel.

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[OFC Ranger]

Why not just remove them?

 

[Extreme01]

Why not just remove them?

How did you remove the rear ones, look like they hit fender

 

[OFC Ranger]

From another thread I posted regarding removing both front and rear crash bars without cutting:

No. You can however loosen one side of the bumper at a time on the front ones to give you some pull/play to pull them out without completely removing the bumper.

The rear ones you have to loose up fender trim to get to the bare fender under it and also do some minor trimming to get clearance to the back ones out unless you feel like taking the whole fender off. It required about 1" or so trimming cutting away some bottom inside fender (dont worry the trim covers it up when you reinstall it) as well as cutting away some of the white plastic "safety block " behind the felt-like wheel well lining. This is required so you actually have the clearance to slide it out. You'll see what I am talking about when you go to slide the rear ones out after unbolting. You basically need about 1 to 1.5" of clearance to pull it out that is block by plastic and fender.

If you go to remove the front by actual removal BE AWARE that the bolts that hold it in, the threaded nut is SPOT WELDED to the main frame housing. Don't be like us when we went to remove the first one we used a butane torch because we thought it was either a mass of red locktite or seized somehow. Turns out we just dumb!. The other three came off easy peasy hahahaha once we realized you need to ratchet it from the top. hahaha

I did not cut mine out because;

1. for whatever odd reason I wanted to keep them in tact in a spare parts bin

2. We didn't have the proper cutting tool anyhow haha


I'll see if I can snap a photo for you later today of what needs to be trimmed for the rear bar complete removal without cutting the bar.

THere are some hidden bolts. I'm doing it this week, so I've been reading about it.

No hidden bolts, just clearance issues sliding the bars out. See above.


Tips you need to know:

- have a buddy on hand, you'll need it to make holding/pulling/tapping/prying much easier

- when you go to pull the front and rear bar out use a pry bar of some fashion. Put the pry bar in the open end of the bar so you can "pry it" sideways (don't worry the housing has play in it) to help in clearance issues. One of you pries while the other inserts a screw driver in the hole the bolt was in and then taps that with a hammer or rubber mallet. When you pry you basically "seize" the bar up against the housing and wacking it like this just gets it out.

If you've trimmed the minimum amount of fender/plastic this method will clear the back bar out with paper thin clearance. Same concept on the front bars, but the prying/tapping is just so you can clear the bumper you loosened up and pulled back.

 

[Extreme01]

From another thread I posted regarding removing both front and rear crash bars without cutting:

Much appreciated bud, I'll give it a shot.

 

[Extreme01]

From another thread I posted regarding removing both front and rear crash bars without cutting:

Much appreciated bud, I'll give it a shot.

 

[Msfitoy]

Much appreciated bud, I'll give it a shot.

I did the same last year...you can find how to in my project...

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