Trailer ball bumper plug
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Cargo Master
Joined: Dec 2015
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Trailer ball bumper plug
It's not NEARLY as much fun as it sounds, I know
Anyway I recently bought an '11 F350. As is common (I've come to find) the rear bumper cover was MANGLED from a PO backing into a trailer tongue. Even the steel plate under the cover had been curled a bit and it was all visible through the missing trailer ball hole plug which just kinda bugged me.
So I removed the cover and straightened out the steel plate as best I could.
Then I grabbed the bumper cover from my old '08 which is in much better shape.
The '08 bumper had a hole for a trailer ball and the accompanying plug - shown upside down in the photo.
The '11 bumper doesn't have a way for a trailer ball to fit even if you wanted to drill a hole, so the plastic plug wouldn't drop in.
So I grabbed some 2.5" Al and chucked it up. I turned a lip about 2.170" by .070" high to drop into the 2 3/16" hole in the bumper cover, then drilled a 1/4" hole in the center. I parted it off about .140" OAH. Dropped it into place, drilled and tapped a 1/4-20 hole in the bumper steel plate and anchored w a SS button head screw (c-sunk flat head would be more trick but I used what I had at 9pm)
Anyway I recently bought an '11 F350. As is common (I've come to find) the rear bumper cover was MANGLED from a PO backing into a trailer tongue. Even the steel plate under the cover had been curled a bit and it was all visible through the missing trailer ball hole plug which just kinda bugged me.
So I removed the cover and straightened out the steel plate as best I could.
Then I grabbed the bumper cover from my old '08 which is in much better shape.
The '08 bumper had a hole for a trailer ball and the accompanying plug - shown upside down in the photo.
The '11 bumper doesn't have a way for a trailer ball to fit even if you wanted to drill a hole, so the plastic plug wouldn't drop in.
So I grabbed some 2.5" Al and chucked it up. I turned a lip about 2.170" by .070" high to drop into the 2 3/16" hole in the bumper cover, then drilled a 1/4" hole in the center. I parted it off about .140" OAH. Dropped it into place, drilled and tapped a 1/4-20 hole in the bumper steel plate and anchored w a SS button head screw (c-sunk flat head would be more trick but I used what I had at 9pm)
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