Overland Journal: Discovery I, 5-speed

[craig]

I'll PM you.

 

[Scott Brady]

Larry, is anything learned when things are diluted to the point that all that is said is something to the effect of: "I like your truck"?

Mike,

I think many concerns were brought to light and some good suggestions were made in these last few pages of posts. There is no doubt anyone reading now knows about the RTE bumpers and how they are a solid choice for the Disco. Nothing was diluted or deleted

 

[DiscoD]

Rob (nosivad_bor),
Sandblast that ****. I just did the RTE on the LR3. I removed the bumper the other day:

...and had everything re-powdercoated. Shackle mounts, fairlead, light bar, etc... The **** looks dope now. 100% better than the RTE coating.

Look how thick the coating is on the famous RTE welds. Normanly they look like a roll of dimes laying there. Now they look like a worm weld like KVT did:

Peep the shackle mounts. Here is a mount from my D1:

See how it's all grainy? Look at the LR3 shackle mount with powdercoating:

This new powdercoating has the look and feel to it that the D1 stock brush guards had back in the day. I have not seen a D1 bursh guard in good shape in a long time, but remember how they seemed to have been dipped in plastic or something? That's what the LR3 bumper looks like now. I just hope it does not start flaking off like the D1 brush guards did....

The roof rack is next.

 

[Mike_rupp]

Mike,

I think many concerns were brought to light and some good suggestions were made in these last few pages of posts. There is no doubt anyone reading now knows about the RTE bumpers and how they are a solid choice for the Disco. Nothing was diluted or deleted

No doubt. I was just addressing the fact that it seems that some people seem to think that a discussion with people on both sides discussing / arguing became unproductive. I think that it was a decent discussion.

 

[Scott Brady]

I would still be interested to know how many of those images of bent bumpers were on SRS mountings.

Maybe someone can answer this too. How much does the RTE and associated hardware weight? Thanks.

 

[Scott Brady]

I think that it was a decent discussion.

And based on what I read, a necessary one too.

 

[timmy!!!!!!!]

I would still be interested to know how many of those images of bent bumpers were on SRS mountings.

Maybe someone can answer this too. How much does the RTE and associated hardware weight? Thanks.

I just talked to RTE today about a slimline for my disco (hopefully my ARB will sell soon) and they said that a ARB is around 130 pounds and there slimline with full brushbar was around 120 pounds if that helps at all.

Scott there is also a pic of a d1 non airbag bent bumper on dweb. In fact it was axels disco that has the bent bumper

http://www.discoweb.org/axel/DSC00136.JPG

 

[lwg]

Larry, is anything learned when things are diluted to the point that all that is said is something to the effect of: "I like your truck"?

I was just trying to get the pi**ing match back on track. Everybody has opinions. For the record I think posting pics of damaged trucks without the full unbiased story is about the equivalent of CNN making accusations based on just photos, or juries making decisions without knowing both sides of the stories.

Everybody has an opinion. I'd dare to say I've gone through more spring/shock options on Land Rovers than anyone on this board, same for bumpers. At the end of the day it comes down to personal preference and what your outfitting your truck to do. I personally love my ARB, albeit a modified one.

To each his/her own. My opinions can get very heated if people push for them as they are my beliefs and I tend to think I know more than most, but then again don't we all

 

[Scott Brady]

Well now, the RTE is even lighter. Hmmmm

I would not have expected the notably stronger bumper to be lighter too. Good on RTE for that. I wonder where they spend and save the weight in the design.

What happened in Axel's "incident"?

Oh, and I did just crawl around my DI for a few minutes in the shop, and the wings do have limited reinforcement (i.e. only the metal bends of a single sheet). I can see that being an issue, even with a light slide off of a rock onto that panel. The rest of the bumper is really solid, much like my Toyota and Defender ARBs. I would like to add some reinforcement to the mounting with additional bolts and material. Easy to do with the welder. I am not an engineer, but looking at the other bumpers we have on trucks, the ARB's construction seems to favor a frontal impact and winching forces. It seems that the wings are not structural at all on the Discovery, mostly cosmetic or for a light bump, like a muddy rut, kissing a tree, etc.

It is also interesting, but the wings on the Disco bumper are pretty long, which equals a lot of leverage. They are noticeably shorter on the Tacoma (which also has several bends and reinforcement over the Disco wing) and over half the length on the Defender and 70 Series TLC. The Defender and TLC also have no sheet metal intersection/proximity to the short wings.

The wings on the Defender are very short.

The wings are also very short on the 70 Series we used in North Africa. And it is the commercial bar, which is designed to mount the 8274. Not sure if that is even more stout or not.

 

[Scott Brady]

I am going to use this quote in the modification article I am working on.

overlanding is the one area of offroading where no compromises should be taken. Rockcrawling, on the other hand, has a relatively low penalty for failure. If you break something in Moab, there will undoubtedly be someone rolling along in a few minutes. If you break something on a seldom used trail in British Columbia, it might be a while before someone rolls along to help.

Edit: to include username in the quote

 

[R_Lefebvre]

I would not have expected the notably stronger bumper to be lighter too. Good on RTE for that. I wonder where they spend and save the weight in the design.

There's simply less material used. The cross section of the RTE is so much smaller. It's only what, 2" deep, vs. 6-8" deep for the ARB. Not to mention the ARB crush cans have a lot more material in them than the simple flat plates used on the RTE. That's what I see from a quick glance.

Geez, I remember the last time I was involved in this argument, the RTE boys were claiming the RTE was stronger "because it's heavier". Interesting turn of events.

Rob Davison, now, is it just me, or are the wings of your RTE bent up?

 

[Scott Brady]

So Dan, did you really just post a picture of an LR3 in my Disco I thread?







... hmmm, contemplating starting new thread with ARB/RTE discussion posts to remove LR3 photos.

 

[DiscoD]

I would still be interested to know how many of those images of bent bumpers were on SRS mountings.

Maybe someone can answer this too. How much does the RTE and associated hardware weight? Thanks.

I've never seen an ARB fold up personally, so I can't answer that question.

I have, however, seen the ARB flex into the fenders under winching on D1 and D2's. ARB's at MAR 2005 claimed a lot of fenders in that mud bath. The SRS ARB's on D1's were very un-popular at that time and I don't think anyone was running the SRS bumper.

The TJM bumpers flexed out pretty bad, too. I don't remember any fenders getting crushed while winching, but I do remember this one guy who had those sweet brush deflectors running from his roof rack to his bumper. Every time he unloaded his winch, those limb risers would go limp. Just a tell-tale sign that the bumper was rotating.

Next time you're out with a group, take a look at the Disco's fitted with ARB's. Look at their fenders. Look at the alignment of the bumper to the vehicle. You know people did not install their ARB bumpers crooked, but pay attention as to what they look like now. You'll find out real quick who uses their truck and who has a truck for show.

Here is another pic showing how the ARB has flexed while in use. This ARB, at that time, was newly installd and only had a few winch pulls on it:

I wonder what the truck, or their trucks, look like now....They had several:

RTE figured out this rotating problem early on. I guess $G did, too. Their bumpers had a mounting system that prevented this from happening.

I know full well the issues you faced when deciding on a bumper for your D1. I had the same issues. I hate the looks of the RTE bumper. I like the SG bumper better, but that's not saying a whole lot. TJM, I think, had about the most attractive bumper as far as looks go. But the TJM, too, is a turd.

There are not many bumpers out there that I do like. Only two come to mind; one was Rob's one-off creation; and the KVT special:

I don't guess either bumper are readily available, and that may be what makes them more attractive to me.

I was able to score an KVT bumper. I got the KVT home and quickly found out what a POS it was. It was a turd. It had nice lines, but the bumper was a turd. It took a lot of work to get the KVT into shape. I could have had two KVT bumpers built in the time it took fix KVT's. But in the end, I'd take another KVT turd over anything ARB has offered.

 

[Antichrist]

Interesting bumper discussion. At times. But the question that really comes to my mind is how many overland trips have ended early (or been substantially delayed) because someone didn't have the perfect bumper?
I honestly think it's being way over analyzed, considering how many millions of overland miles that have been traveled with a bumper no more substantial than this.

 

[stevenmd]

Interesting bumper discussion. At times. But the question that really comes to my mind is how many overland trips have ended early (or substantially delayed) because someone didn't have the perfect bumper?
I honestly think it's being way over analyzed, considering how many millions of overland miles that have been traveled with a bumper no more substantial than this.

True. But aren't most recovery points on a series mounted directly to the frame and not the bumper? That fact has to come into play. It seems most DI/DII/RRC bumpers have the recovery points mounted on the bumper, which is usually held on by 6 bolts. However, I'm not sure how the winch trays on the series rigs are mounted.