Once I raised my front upper shock mounts (factory style mounting pins) slightly more than the body lift I soon noticed these little dents. I guess I'm in the club.
Visual Guide: How much material needs to be removed from Exogate for use with Savvy LED taillights?
- Thread starter Chris
- Start date
Probably not, but just be aware of it. Driving styles and terrain may change for you. Trevor may have watched to many KOH videos. LOL
OP
Haha, good point! I'll keep an eye on it nonetheless. I guess at some point you'll break anything.
Recently I sold some used parts to a guy with a TJ who came over to pick them up. He showed me his bumper mounted spare tire carrier, and I kid you not, the tire carrier literally ripping itself away from the bumper.
Can't remember the brand, but it was something he bought, not built. Either way, he had mentioned he didn't do any desert style racing, just typical lower speed off-roading.
I'm learning about that battle right now. It took 60k miles, but my bumper mounted carrier without any tailgate snubbers started cracking last spring.
I've never seen an Exogate spare tire carrier up close but Chris said it ties into the rear rollbar supports, as my OR-Fab spare tire carrier does. If that's the case as it was with my OR-Fab carrier, most of the load of a heavy spare tire is carried by the the rear rollbar mounts, not the tub.
OP
I assume it's cracking around where the tire carrier is inserted / welded into the bumper?
Like I said, I suppose you can break just about anything if you try hard enough. I just went with the Exogate because it seemed like a better option that a bumper mounted carrier.
Yes, but the tub carries the roll bar. Over weighting the tub without cage tie ins or similar will make the tub smash itself down onto the body mounts.
What carries the weight of the roll bar supports? I haven't looked closely enough up there, so I'm not entirely sure beyond a suspicion.
The hinge area appears to be fine. No rust dust indicating a crack. The first crack was at the tire mount. There might have been another on a weld opposite the hinge near the latch. I plated and gusset those areas and others. Then I added a snubber to the trailgate to arrest the constant vibrations. Now that I see what is happening, it needs a bit more in the way of vibration control.
Even if you aren't actively abusing things, time will eventually catch up to an inadequate design. That's what I'm dealing with.
What I was referring to is if the Exogate is attached to the rollbar bases, it is distributing the load over more points instead of just to its hinges as it appears. This is how my OR-Fab carrier distributes its loading...
This combination view of the left-right obviously isn't of my TJ but it being yellow allows the brackets that distribute the load to be easily seen. If the Exogate has some kind of bracket that also attaches to the rollbar base as Chris said it does that's a very good thing.
This combination view of the left-right obviously isn't of my TJ but it being yellow allows the brackets that distribute the load to be easily seen. If the Exogate has some kind of bracket that also attaches to the rollbar base as Chris said it does that's a very good thing.
OP
The Exogate bracket is very close to that. It only covers the top portion though, it doesn't actually go down the side of the wheel well. Of course I could easy create an attachment for it that did the same thing.