ARB Bull Bumper Install

The TJ front bumper is designed to collapse upon impact to minimize occupant injury as the front crushes. While this may be fine for relatively high speed encounters on the road, this was definitely a disadvantage off road. In fact, Jeep does not sell a bumper-mounted tow bar for the TJ due to the designed flimsiness of the bumper! I needed a durable front bumper that was impact resistant, winch capable, relatively light, and provided some measure of impact protection for the front   edge of the fenders. At the same time it should not measurably detract from the approach angle of the Jeep. After debating about the various merits of the offerings by Currie, Tomken, Bulletproof, etc., I decided on the ARB bull bumper.

The folks at ARB in Australia designed a line of bumpers that was tough enough to endure the harsh environment of the Outback, withstand shear and impact forces from the front and sides as an integral front crossmember, and survive collisons with objects like the errant kangaroo! This bumper differs from others by its open back design and integrated winch plate that mounts the winch low inside the body of the bumper. This saves weight and allows better air circulation to the radiator. The bumper is CADCAM manufactured and protected from the elements by a hot phosphate wash and thick powdercoating. It has two mounting tabs for lights, gussetted tow tabs, and integrated side lights that can be wired as accessory turn signals or running lights. It's bottom edges are beveled and slope upwards at the tips to allow the bumper to glance off objects and to preserve approach angle. It is primarily designed to accept the Warn 8000 and 9000 series winches, but will also work with the Ramsey 8000 and 9000 Pro/ProPlus series (with slight modifications).

The bumper is a one piece unit that weights 85 pounds. It comes will all necessary hardware, but without instructions (at least mine did)! I installed my bumper with help from Dave Gray's excellent writeup on the YJ installation.

So on with the install...

Remove move the two Torx screws that attach the top of the original bumper to each frame rail. Remove the additional Torx screw that holds the underside of the bumper to the frame rail. Discard all these bolts as they will be replaced by new hardware. If not previously done, remove and discard the plastic cover over the front sway bar. If applicable, the original front tow hooks and fog lamps should be removed and cannot be reused.

The ARB has an integrated winch plate. Attach the fairlead to the front of the bumper. The Ramsey roller fairlead was a direct bolt in.

Center and bolt in the winch, then feed the cable through the fairlead and connect the hook. Be sure to place the winch far enough back to allow access to the winch spool and clutch release. Unfortunately the right light tab partially blocks access to the clutch release knob on the Ramsey ProPlus 9000. It's a little tight, but still accessable. The drivers side edge  of the winch opening did not provide enough clearance for the bolt heads that hold the clutch assembly. Two notches created with a Dremel Mototool fixed this.

Lift the bumper/winch assembly (it takes two people) and slide it onto the frame horns. Use the two supplied shims to ensure that the bumper sits evenly on the top of rails and is level. Use the supplied grade 5 bolts to secure the bumper to the frame through the holes for the original bumper.

Two amber lights are supplied that snap into the cutouts at each end of the bumper. Use the supplied harness to splice into the existing side light circuits such that these lights function either as ancillary turn signals or parking lights. Wire up your winch and any other lights, and you're done!

The ARB bumper fits very snugly against the bottom edge of the fender. I have a 1" body lift installed, and you can see that the gap measures only 1 1/2 inches.

The final side profile shows that despite its bulk the bumper does not compromise the approach angle, and matches the inner contours of the fender flare.

The steering box is unprotected, so I modified a Tomken steering box skid plate by notching the rear edge to accomodate the tow points of the bumper and drilled an additional mouting hole.

I added a pair of black powdercoated Hella 4000 Euro Beam lights that are wired with the high beams and are controllable with a dash-mounted switch. I strongly recommend that the seperately available wiring harness and solenoid be used due to the high amp draw of these lights. A pair of IPF yellow projector fog lamps pointed 15 degrees outwards were placed behind the crossbar to illuminate objects close and off to the side. These lights are wired into the parking light circuit, but are switchable. Again, the included wiring harness was used to minimize the risk of electrical fire. My TJ Sport was ordered without fog lights, but arrived with all the relays and wiring in place. I ordered the factory fog lamp switch and used the stock relay to power the light harness.

The install time was 2 hours, but the wiring of the lights, switches and winch took another 3 hours.

As you can see the transformation is dramatic, and JeepThing now has the aggressive looks to match the protection and utility that the ARB bumper gives. The sole problem with this bumper is that at full compression my 33" Swampers rub against the back edge of the bumper. Note that Super Swampers are truly 33" tall, as opposed to the radial equivalents made by other manufacturers which are somewhat less tall. I removed 2 inches from the back edge and reboxed the ends to allow uninhibited movement.