There you go, drag out the welder. I built bumpers for two of the jeeps that I have had in the past. There are actually places online where you can get pre-bent tubing, and brackets, and other odds and ends that make building them pretty easy.

 

Wow! That's worth knowing. Thanks!

 

 

Man. That is awesome. Wish I had that kind of budget.

 

 

 

Best advice is DON'T mess with the loops. If you really need a front point put a drawbar behind the mounts, at least that way you're dealing with known ratings. The way the tow loops are mounted are what's important, the shear strength of a 5/8" Grade 8 bolt is something like 30,000#, and the loop is just a steel wire well in excess of that. I've posted a picture before from the History Channel show Axemen where a company lifted a Super Duty out of a ditch using the front two tow eyes attached to clevis' and run up cables to a bar. In original form, the eyes will handle several times the vehicle weight in static situations.

Dynamic situations are what worry me. This kind of a bracket (linked below) exists, but I can't do an engineering calc (since I"m not an engineer) on what the torsional strength of 1/4" cold rolled sheet is so I don't know if I'd trust these parts it in terms of recovery use. I doubt the part would fail, but if it bends once it's done and needs to be replaced.
Tow Hook Eliminator Brackets - 11-15 Ford Super Duty - DirtyDiesels

Roughly speaking, being stuck to your hubs on a 15% incline can mean the line pull weight of my truck is over 250% of it's base weight, so around 20,000# easily for me. Body level stuck on flat ground with any kind of damage could be 24000#+ easily. Hitting the 30,000# strength of the fastener with a dynamic pull is not an academic exercise in any sense, I've been in places with stock trucks that definitely exceed common recovery gear ratings. If you're going to break the rules, at least know them first:
Pirate4x4.Com - Extreme Four Wheel Drive

If you don't plan on really using the eyes for anything heavy, get a bracket made at a local fab shop to your specs. Any decent shop will be able to cut the holes a piece of sheet and have a press brake that can handle the bend to get the mounting points where you need them.

 

 

Wow! Thanks for all this advice. I was definitely leaning toward modding the brush guard before modding the tow hooks for exactly the reason you state. They almost fit. Just think I would need to alter the brush guard a tiny bit in order to get them to fit.

Thanks!