JeepinJason33
Well-Known Member
Attacked this yesterday, what a pain in the butt. Most of my problems came from my aftermarket ACE bumper. This thing does not line up right and it was very difficult to get on the first time. Due to the way the bumper comes back around on the sides, I had to remove it and all the wiring to be able to drill through.
First thing I noticed when I opened the bag of parts from Maximus 3 was that I did not have the sleeves seen in the picture someone else posted. I called Joe and he said that they no longer use those and it was a test. Secondly, the bolt that goes through the threaded hole that you drill out is the same hole on the other side of the frame that my winch mount attaches to. I thought about just drilling out the outside threads and then pushing the bolt through and threading it on the winch mount side. I still think that would have worked, but Joe suggested drilling the entire thing out and if I was going to do that, I should just put a 1/2" bolt in there. Made sense to me as this would also make the winch mount stronger.
The drilling of the holes was not that difficult, really only takes a few minutes if you step it up correctly. I used two smaller drill bits before putting the 1/2" bit into the hole and that really worked well. The problem with drilling out the middle hole to 1/2" is that the tow loop bracket hole was not 1/2"!!! I had to pull it off and put it into a vice and try to ream out the slot, this is tougher because it is not a hole that you can easily keep the drill bit in. The good news is it did not take much to pull off the powder coating and make the hole a bit bigger.
Another problem is the top bolt sits too close to the top of the bracket. I had to file that down and hammer the bolt in to get it to clear the top of the bracket. I drilled this dead on so it was not a mistake on my end. That bolt is very difficult to get an allen wrench to once the bumper is on. The only one I had that big was on a T handle and would not fit. Fortunately, I had one on a socket, but be warned...
So, if you are going to drill all the way through and have a similar winch plate you will need a 1/2"-13 X 6" bolt. If you don't you can get away with the 5" pictured below. The 6" was too long and the 5" did not give me enough threads to be comfortable with. Not sure if they make a 5 1/2", all I had laying around was the 5 and 6. (I have a Lowe's type selection of bolts in my garage, over 1,000!).
The majority of my time was spent jacking around with the bumper trying to get everything to line back up again. I would say that if you had a stock bumper you could probably do this in one to two hours including taking the bumper off.
Also glam shot of two of my Jeeps in Sand Hollow earlier this year, it shows the front bumper and how it comes around the side.
First thing I noticed when I opened the bag of parts from Maximus 3 was that I did not have the sleeves seen in the picture someone else posted. I called Joe and he said that they no longer use those and it was a test. Secondly, the bolt that goes through the threaded hole that you drill out is the same hole on the other side of the frame that my winch mount attaches to. I thought about just drilling out the outside threads and then pushing the bolt through and threading it on the winch mount side. I still think that would have worked, but Joe suggested drilling the entire thing out and if I was going to do that, I should just put a 1/2" bolt in there. Made sense to me as this would also make the winch mount stronger.
The drilling of the holes was not that difficult, really only takes a few minutes if you step it up correctly. I used two smaller drill bits before putting the 1/2" bit into the hole and that really worked well. The problem with drilling out the middle hole to 1/2" is that the tow loop bracket hole was not 1/2"!!! I had to pull it off and put it into a vice and try to ream out the slot, this is tougher because it is not a hole that you can easily keep the drill bit in. The good news is it did not take much to pull off the powder coating and make the hole a bit bigger.
Another problem is the top bolt sits too close to the top of the bracket. I had to file that down and hammer the bolt in to get it to clear the top of the bracket. I drilled this dead on so it was not a mistake on my end. That bolt is very difficult to get an allen wrench to once the bumper is on. The only one I had that big was on a T handle and would not fit. Fortunately, I had one on a socket, but be warned...
So, if you are going to drill all the way through and have a similar winch plate you will need a 1/2"-13 X 6" bolt. If you don't you can get away with the 5" pictured below. The 6" was too long and the 5" did not give me enough threads to be comfortable with. Not sure if they make a 5 1/2", all I had laying around was the 5 and 6. (I have a Lowe's type selection of bolts in my garage, over 1,000!).
The majority of my time was spent jacking around with the bumper trying to get everything to line back up again. I would say that if you had a stock bumper you could probably do this in one to two hours including taking the bumper off.
Also glam shot of two of my Jeeps in Sand Hollow earlier this year, it shows the front bumper and how it comes around the side.
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