black plastic below front bumper
 

i have a 94 f150

does that black plastic peice below the front bumper (about 3 inches wide) serve any kind of purpose? does it protect the control arm under the body? or is it just for looks? cuz personally i dont like the way it looks and it gets in my way when i jack up the front. i want to remove it but wanna double check that its not there to protect the control arms or something else from gettin pegged with rocks. if its just for show, its gonna go. tehehe i ryhmed :-D

Yes, very good rhyme. The black plastics thing you are referring to is to help with wind resistance. It is basically a front spoiler, as least that what the local Ford Dealer referred to it as. Supposed to help with the air flow under the truck, not vital to survive at all.

ah i see, pretty much push the wind down so its not whipping thru all the stuff underneither, lil more aerodynamics. i think ill remove it anyway. how aerodynamic can a pick up truck be anyway, hehe

Yeah, our trucks have the aerodynamics of a brick so go for it.

Aerodynamics, really? I thought it was some sort of protection or just for looks. Wow.

I talked with the parts guy at the local Ford dealer and he seemed to know what's what. And I asked what it was really there for and he said to push the air down so it doesn't whipe through as much stuff underneath, and it may help slightly with protection but it is just plastic so not too much. He agreed that the aerodynamics are equal to a brick and therefore I wouldn't miss it if I took it off. He called it an air dam.

how exactly do u remove this thing? its like riveted on....

Take a small angle grinder and carefully cut off heads inside the bumper, takes about 5 minutes.

I also want to take mine off (93 F150). I read that you can drill out those rivets...can I?

Yep, but center punch where you're gonna drill even if recessed. You don't want to take any chrome off the bumper.

i know that when i had one on my dodge (which was traded for a ford), it was called a bumper valance. i took the dang thing off cuz it just made the ground clearance appear higher when it was off. just something extra to haul around.......

I pried mine off with a screwdriver. It worked good. Looks a ton better now, too.

It does look better off. Has anyone taken off that other strip that runs in the middle of the bumper?

i think the strip that runs down the middle has holes cut into the bumper for the clips to mount on, so if u took it off youd have all the holes running down the middle of your bumper. at least i think thats how i remember it, havent been under there in awhile

Yup, the black plastic piece that is up by the license plate has holes spaced evenly along the entire length of the bumper, you wouldn't like the look with all them ugly holes.