In an effort to contribute to this great site, I decided to document this mini-journey. It starts off with my neighborhood, overrun by deer and the occasional bear or mountain lion. Headlight repair sucks, aftermarket grills are expensive, and who has time to do repairs? So I found a used brushguard on facebook marketplace I acquired for the no brainer price of $220. It has a dent, rust, and the character of the 1999 F250 it came off of.

I wirewheeled it for an hour, just knocking off the loose rust, not polishing to a bare metal everywhere. I dumped 2.75 cans of Rustolium bedliner on, doing a coat every hour, loosing count of how many coats (possibly from vapor inhalation from the complete lack of wind movement that day) and saved 0.25 of a can in case I needed touchups during the install. After 4 days of curing, (not needed, just how my schedule was) this was the final product.

The grill guard has tow hooks on either side at the bottom, (see them on the outside right under the bracket?) so removal of the original ones is required for the bracket to mount. This proved to be the reason for my sore forearms this morning. Also, the bumper had to be removed, which there are several threads to this step, so I won't beat the dead horse. There are 3 15mm bolts that hold hooks in place and as reiterated several times in this forum, need to be replaced in some form for front-in-collision integrity (I read it on the internet, so it has to be true). The nuts are welded to the hook, so access is under the hook and frame piece. Oh, and don't bother with penetration oil, they are red locktited and need heat.



The replacement bolts came from another brush guard install, and they are rated to my satisfaction, so here is a picture of them in place. I did add all 3 on both sides.

I also buzzed off some of the exposed rust on the frame and sealed it with the liner as well. Glad I saved that 0.25 can. Then came lining up the brush guard to the bumper to the frame which required a floor jack (folded moving blanket on it to not scratch the finish) a helppy helper to run alignment bolts from the inside to out on the TOP hole to just hold the monstrosity in place until the bumper bolt can be run to hold it all in place, then remove the alignment bolts and run the bumper bolts. Because the bumper has only 2 bolts, 2 more need to be drilled to put the remaining hardware in. I just did this by first aligning the frame/bumper/brush guard to satisfaction, then using the brushguard as a template to place my bolt. Started off small then opened her up to fit the frame hole once I could feel the hole from the inside. Now the before and after shots!

 

Nice job! That should help keep the critters out of the important stuff.

 

Thanks! I had a hard time rationalizing $1800-2800 for a new one. Next project: rear bumper to tire holder mod. Waiting till spring though, but I might mock one out of 2x4s to get the measurements right.