HI All
I bought an older (1994) GMC Topkick that had a bent up bumper and a little passenger side fender damage as a result of the previous owner hitting a deer (got lucky mainly bumper damage BUT I'm sure it could have been much worse)
I had gone to several big truck junkyards searching for a usable front bumper (truck looks good other than the bumper and a small chunk missing from the passenger side front fender) but could not find one so I decided to go with a straight home made front bumper (.282 inch thick metal "C" channel.....12" tall and 3 inch deep...had to be spaced out using 1/4" wall thickness rectangular tube to clear mist body / frame parts and bolted up to the factory bumper support using 7/16 bolts (factory used 4 bolts to hold the bumper, I used 6 due to the added weight).
The C channel bumper itself is WAY heavier than factory bumper ( new bumper C channel weighs in at 166 Lbs....I haven't weighed the factory one but I' do that later today....it's MUCH lighter tho) and that made me think that the weak link in the bumper system has to be the original factory mounts (the truck frame seems beefy enough I guess since its got the leaf spring mounts to beef up the area).
I thought about beefing those up as well (the bumper frame mounts) BUT I'm wondering if everything gets too beefed up and lacks "give" then the frame would be the be next to be tweaked in an accident with a deer or possibly other vehicle (this made me think about double or triple framing the area of the frame and adding another cross member to strengthen the area that may be "tweaked" if the bumper acts as a lever arm and wants to twist the frame in an accident).
To protect the radiator against deer I thought about using rectangular tubing (and expanded to keep deer parts out of the grill) attached (bolted for easy replacement in case I have to replace it after a deer strike) to the new heavy c channel frame but rather than have it simply go straight up I thought I'd go up BUT angled forward so if the deer made contact and bent the "guard" backwards it would not hit any body work (it seems to me most grill guards go straight up from the bumper so if it gets bent back a bit it still damages the grill...kinda counter productive since now you have a damaged guard AND damaged grill etc...I'm thinking about building so beefy the only thing you have to do after a deer strike is hose off the bumper...
Of course angling the upright guard forward does make the overall length of the truck longer and in theory may deflect the deer downward which may not be good since then the deer ends up under the truck ?
I know much of this may seem to be overkill BUT this year alone I have hit 3 deer (I mainly drive at night) and yes I look for them and have high powered lights but sometimes they just pop out.
Has anybody here done done any bumper beefing or made themselves any deer guards?
Any other ideas, comments or concerns?
Thanks in advance for any and all help.
Andrew
PS- I estimate when I add the Grill guard and misc extra beefing I'll probably be about 300 lbs in a bumper / guard system....
I bought an older (1994) GMC Topkick that had a bent up bumper and a little passenger side fender damage as a result of the previous owner hitting a deer (got lucky mainly bumper damage BUT I'm sure it could have been much worse)
I had gone to several big truck junkyards searching for a usable front bumper (truck looks good other than the bumper and a small chunk missing from the passenger side front fender) but could not find one so I decided to go with a straight home made front bumper (.282 inch thick metal "C" channel.....12" tall and 3 inch deep...had to be spaced out using 1/4" wall thickness rectangular tube to clear mist body / frame parts and bolted up to the factory bumper support using 7/16 bolts (factory used 4 bolts to hold the bumper, I used 6 due to the added weight).
The C channel bumper itself is WAY heavier than factory bumper ( new bumper C channel weighs in at 166 Lbs....I haven't weighed the factory one but I' do that later today....it's MUCH lighter tho) and that made me think that the weak link in the bumper system has to be the original factory mounts (the truck frame seems beefy enough I guess since its got the leaf spring mounts to beef up the area).
I thought about beefing those up as well (the bumper frame mounts) BUT I'm wondering if everything gets too beefed up and lacks "give" then the frame would be the be next to be tweaked in an accident with a deer or possibly other vehicle (this made me think about double or triple framing the area of the frame and adding another cross member to strengthen the area that may be "tweaked" if the bumper acts as a lever arm and wants to twist the frame in an accident).
To protect the radiator against deer I thought about using rectangular tubing (and expanded to keep deer parts out of the grill) attached (bolted for easy replacement in case I have to replace it after a deer strike) to the new heavy c channel frame but rather than have it simply go straight up I thought I'd go up BUT angled forward so if the deer made contact and bent the "guard" backwards it would not hit any body work (it seems to me most grill guards go straight up from the bumper so if it gets bent back a bit it still damages the grill...kinda counter productive since now you have a damaged guard AND damaged grill etc...I'm thinking about building so beefy the only thing you have to do after a deer strike is hose off the bumper...
Of course angling the upright guard forward does make the overall length of the truck longer and in theory may deflect the deer downward which may not be good since then the deer ends up under the truck ?
I know much of this may seem to be overkill BUT this year alone I have hit 3 deer (I mainly drive at night) and yes I look for them and have high powered lights but sometimes they just pop out.
Has anybody here done done any bumper beefing or made themselves any deer guards?
Any other ideas, comments or concerns?
Thanks in advance for any and all help.
Andrew
PS- I estimate when I add the Grill guard and misc extra beefing I'll probably be about 300 lbs in a bumper / guard system....
