you know that over sized piece of plastic that drops 5" below the front bumper?

i think i want to take mine off. the dealer says its for aerodynamics / fuel economy.

MAYBE thats a good theory, but as a red blooded American, i just cant see how much fuel efficiency it adds, or how its going to survive one trip through the field at the hunting land....

time to scrap it?

 

When added to the 08's it did improve air movement and mileage.

 

that is the purpose of it. It will get torn off as it is rather low. It didn't help us either.

 

the design is to keep air from catching on things under the truck.

Sam

 

I noticed on the '11 compared the the '08 I had that there are more pieces of metal mounted under the bumper and they drop maybe 2 inches below the surface of the bumper. I assume this is to prevent the truck from driving over a car if an accident occurs. The air dam seems to hide these things too. My '08 did not have any of these brackets so the air dam did not really do anything other than what has already been mentioned.

To the OP: Check out the air dam that is installed on the 2WD models, maybe it will be smaller and might be an option for you to put on your truck. I have not seen a 2WD '11 yet so I don't really know if it is different.

 

If you remove the air dam, those frame brackets will be visible. Paint them white and the truck will look like a vampire...

 

Now that was funny

 

I was under my truck today cleaning the inside of the wheels and I noticed the two brackets behind the airdam. I don't think it will look good with them showing.

 

I was thinking about removing it for a week and seeing my real world results. If its no change in mpg's, and it looked better, I would pull the brackets off too. I know why they put them on to help with running over cars, but why don't they mandate extended ones if you lift your truck? Must be Ford covering their social accountability behinds maybe??

 

after looking under the truck a bit longer, i think i will be removing the plastic and the two brackets that hang down. i just cant stand how low it looks.

 

well if any of you are still curious, i started taking off my front flare under the bumper.

there is a terrible looking lip that is part of the bumper that curves down, its rough and not chromed like the bumper.

in my opinion it would not look very good.

it would be nice to find a shorter flare maybe from another vehicle that doesnt hang so far down.

 

That's weird cause I was just looking at mine again today thinking about taking it off. I guess I'll look this weekend. I'm wondering if it would be that hard to cut off the part you're talking about and then touching it up with krylon and some chrome paint.

 

Just put a bumper replacement on and you don't have to worry bout the air dam and the two brackets hanging down. Put a cattleman's bumper on mine.

 

I'm too cheap for that, oops I mean too innovative, yeah that's it innovative.

 

the FX4 truck has a shorter air dam... maybe that would work for you? I like the way mine looks just fine