Ironman 4x4 bumper installed

Finally had the ironman 4x4 Raid series bumper and their winch installed, it completely changed the look in a good way. I love it. I am trying to think if i should do a build-up post of my tundra. Maybe it's not too late?

 

Very Nice! I am thinking of getting one myself. What do you have for a front skid? I was wondering if it worked with the RCI front skid.

 

Looks good. Good job.

 

I did take a video of it underneath. Let me get a screen shot.

 

I wear mirrors on my shoes so I can glance at skid plates. Thank you this was very satisfying.

 

no problem.

 

Thank you.

 

Do you recommend the optional lights from Ironman or would you choose different lights?

 

I'd get different lights since I have a specific preferences about the lights I put on. and I like to test them around. I have some videos of how they perform on my tundra if you are interested.

 

THANK YOU to @king.cong.1119 for allowing me to tag onto this thread to help the community minimize searching, and his fantastic vids on his YouTube channel showing the bumper in action!!

My experience with the IM4x4 front bumper has been a tad bit challenging unfortunately . But hopefully, my "pain" will help others who buy this bumper. Even though the installation process and quality of powder coating on the recovery points was disappointing, I am still very happy with the robust engineering of this bumper, and love the way it looks on my rig. I'd buy it again.

Packaging: VERY WELL packaged, probably some of the best packaging I've seen, especially for shipping powder coated parts. They wrap each individual component with a thick foam-like sheet (not sure of the technical name of the wrap, but pretty thick mils). Unwrapping revealed no nicks, dings, etc.



Installation: in the IM installation video, the editors left out some key installation instructions...possibly because they are a PITA! First, mounting the 32" LED bar with the supplied grille was impossible to do at a straight-on angle into the bumper; there's no way it'll fit through from the outside of the bumper (too wide with LED bar mounting bolts), and if you try it at a straight-on angle from the inside of the bumper, the grille is too tall. I called IM support, and they didn't know how to do it. I figured it out myself...you have to install it from the inside of the bumper, angling the bar/grille assembly as you insert it. It's a tight fit requiring some force (TWSS ), and it does scuff the powder coating a little bit when you do it, but not to the bare metal since the PC is forgiving enough on the winch tray and the bumper itself (unlike the PC on the recovery points, see below).



Second, there are no instructions, video or paper, that explain how you use the parking sensor kit. The IM CSR did not know how to install the kit either. Again, I figured it out myself: you have to take an outer shell off the OEM parking sensor to get the sensor to go through the plastic mount that IM has with the kit, screw the backing plate from the kit into plastic mount so the sensor doesn't back out, put the adhesive strip on the assembled piece, and push it through the hole from the inside of the bumper to the outside. UPDATE: IM actually does have instructions for the parking sensors in their REAR BUMPER installation video. A little video editing and they could include that same segment in the front bumper installation video.



Third, it is IMPOSSIBLE to put the center top plate onto the bumper when it is mounted onto the truck with the OEM grille still on the vehicle (the install video shows them installing the bumper without removing the OEM grille), as there is no room for you to fit your hands in there to hold the nut UNLESS you completely remove the OEM grille , and even if you do remove the OEM grille, it's still very tight if you have fat wrists and digits like me. Wags saying in the video that you can easily adjust the 32" bar's angle once the bumper is mounted is not accurate without the nuts falling down into the winch tray when you remove the center top plate. So, when I went to install the center top plate, I used duct tape to hold the nuts on; the nuts are serrated, so they eventually grab the powder coating and tighten. Some of the duct tape did come loose though, so if I have to remove that plate, the nuts will fall into the winch tray. I know they did not weld the nuts onto the bottom of the plate so there's better adjustability when aligning everything, but still, a PITA.



Powder coating on the recovery points: as soon as the nut and washer contacted the PC of the recovery points, with very little torque, the PC started peeling at all 12 bolt mounting points. When I told IM this and sent them pics, the CSR said to "fix it yourself and we'll reimburse you". Not a customer-focused response IMO. However, @king.cong.1119 brought up a great point...the recovery points will probably be dinged up anyways during offroading and/or recovery, so that logic calmed me down a bit. Still, they apparently lack some QC (even though an inspection sticker is attached), and the company's policy about the issue is concerning if other issues pop up. My recovery points might be from a bad batch of PC that did not set/adhere properly. As mentioned above, the PC on the winch tray and the bumper itself was great.



Other than those issues, I am happy with the bumper. Again, I believe it is well-engineered; for example, IM provides mounting "dogbones" and a bolt on each side which further secure the winch tray to the frame, so now there are 5 bumper-mounting bolts per side (4 OEM and 1 IM). This is important, as anyone who has either replaced the OEM bumper or installed bumper shims can tell you that the 4 OEM bumper-mounting nuts and bolts per side welded to the frame can cross-thread and strip very easily, and people have even ripped bumpers off during recovery due to these weak mounting points (on Tundras AND Tacos). Also, the 6 bolts per side used to mount the bumper to the winch tray through the recovery points basically then make it all one structural unit, making it even more robust for recovery.



I purchased the front and rear bumpers during their holiday sale (rear bumper should be here this Friday), where they offered discounting and "free" lighting; you could choose every lighting option, which I did, and I'll see how all these pods and the bar hold up (they look like decent quality lights, hopefully no condensation issues). Total delivered to my house was about $3K. I elected to wire the LED bar, the inner pods, and the outer pods, to one switch on my Switch Pros 9100, for offroading lighting. The outer pods I mounted at about a 45-degree horizontal angle pointing outwards to serve as quasi-ditch lights. Inner pods and LED bar pretty much angled vertically straight on for offroading. Regarding the middle pods, I tied them into my factory fog light switch on the steering wheel turn-signal stem, and angled them downward slightly as not to offend oncoming drivers. These things are definitely brighter than my other Nilight cheapo Amazon bars (which BTW are still actually holding up after years with no condensation issues, but the mounting bolts and threaded holes are starting to rust pretty badly).



I hope this post helps someone, and thanks for reading!!

 

Just uploaded a video of my IRONMAN 4X4 RAID bumper after 2 years of ownership.

 

Makes me feel even better, thanks for posting @king.cong.1119 !!

Rear bumper came this afternoon, once again excellent packaging, can’t wait to install this weekend!

 

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE if your REAR bumper recovery points crack and peel when you start to tighten down the bolts, take pics and send them to Ironman 4x4, and complain mightily!! The rear recovery points did not crack and peel. I think they got a bad batch of powder coating on the front recovery points from their outside coater.

 

Gotcha. Let me know if you have any issues, be glad to help!

 

Installed the IM 4x4 rear bumper. Went much smoother than the front. FYI, while the instructions for the parking sensor kit aren't in the IM front bumper install video, they are in the rear bumper install video. Seems with some simple video editing they can insert the segment into the front install video.

Packaging was as good as the front bumper. Powder coating was perfect on the recovery points for the rear bumper, vs. the coating on the front bumper recovery points that cracked and peeled (see my front bumper post above); reinforces my theory that a bad batch of powder coating slipped by their QC folks.

PLEASE NOTE that the clearance between the tailgate when it's down and the bumper is PRETTY TIGHT. I'd say 1/4" to 3/8". I've seen aftermarket panels that affix to the tailgate with adhesive; if you have one of those, clearance will be even tighter. I definitely will not be sitting on or loading heavy things onto the tailgate without putting some rubber or something between.



The only real issue I had was the dust cover plate that sits behind the pods. IM gives you an option on their website when ordering to select 40-watt pods for the inner pod mounting locations, and an option to select 20-watt red pods for the outer pod mounting location. The 40-watt pod is of course bigger than the 20-watt, and the 40-watt will NOT fit in either the inside or outside pod mounting locations, without notching out the dust cover plate. So, you can either do that (which I did, shown below, notched areas pointed out with red arrows, don't forget to apply some black paint to the exposed metal once you're done notching ), or, when you order, call IM and tell them you want the smaller 20-watt pods for both mounting locations.



I tied the 40-watt flood pods into my reverse light circuit, and the 20-watt red pods into my brake light circuit. Angled down a smidge as not to be offensive to other drivers. Overall, happy with this bumper and how stoutly is is engineered and fabbed together.

 

very nice! I like how the light lens appear to be clear and the actual led are red.

 

How much was the total weight of the bumper and winch, did it make a difference in the handling?

 

Not sure about weight, but it handles no differently than when I had my winch in the SDHQ hidden winch mount.

 

I pulled the right rear taillight fixture and tapped into the positive blue wire of the driving and brake light bulb harness for the positive on the pod, and the black and white wire for the negative on the pod, for the brake light pods. For the reverse pods, I tapped into the positive reverse wire in the trailer harness underneath the truck; not sure what wire that is since I tapped into it a long time ago when I installed the flush mount Nilight LED's in the factory bumper, but there is a diagram on the front of the trailer harness (I used the chassis for the negative).

Regarding mounting, definitely easier to mount the pods and dust cover bracket while off, then adjust and wire while on. Regarding adjustment, I had to take an allen wrench and cut off a bit of it so it could squeeze between the pods:

 

Yes, he mentions removing the entire bumper instead of piece by piece at the beginning of the video. I elected piece by piece, since I had to disassemble everything anyways to pull the BSM/RCTA sensors and brackets out to sell.

 

Stoked! Just ordered the front bumper today and took advantage of their really good sale. Now the wait begins.

 

That's quick. 4 days from when you ordered it or 4 days of shipping?

 

Just got notice from the shipper that it's supposed to be delivered tomorrow. We'll see if that actually happens.

 

Tracking progress has updated and it is in transit. Kind of a bummer because I'm having it sent to my work and we only work 4 days a week (closed on Fridays). I might have to show up here for a little bit tomorrow.

 

Well a day and a half after placing the order and I have my new bumper. Now I need to install it. Good thing it’s going to be raining this weekend. Perfect project for bad weather.

 

very helpful, thanks for sharing and for all the pics!!

 

@Cthulhu or anyone that has installed this, did you have some parts left over? I have some things I have no idea where they go:


Everything else has gone pretty smooth. Just on final step of hanging bumper and would rather not have to take it off if I missed something.

Thanks

 

I ordered RAID front and rear last week. My truck needs some body work. So I removed the stock front and rear in prep for the RAIDs to save some body shop labor. I went ahead and added the light bar since it was only $100 extra instead of $400 if ordered separate.