Bumper Swap

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crroberts

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Well.. I was out driving around and went off of about a 4 inch drop off into a small dip and behold. My plastic one piece express bumper is cracked. This is a second one. As a deer got the first one. What would it take to replace the one piece plastic with the 2 piece like the slt?
 

arod412

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Don't have an answer man. Is it the bottom of the bumper itself, or is it the plastic underneath? Maybe a pic will help.

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yodge

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My bumper is cracked from the same thing. The bumpers are too fragile.


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Burla

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It is a lot harder to take off a bumper then put the new one on. Biggest pain is the way they attack the bumper at the corner there is a one way screw that took me a hour to get because I couldn't get a sawzaw in there w/o damaging the fender. You can put the 2 piece on, you just need to forget about all that plastic junk. All you need is the plastic backer for the top piece, all the other stuff is unnecessary.

Is it a 4x4? If so maybe you want a ranch hand? here is what I did. Wont have to worry about deer. If I had to do over I wouldn't get a full wrap, but the ranch hands are a great piece of safety equip.
 
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crroberts

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I'm liking that.. No need to have a 2 piece bumper with the plastic piece under the headlights. I'm definitely gonna look into that.
 

Burla

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The big problem is there only a few companies making it for the 1500. Iron Cross and Fab Fours where the only two I could find in 2010. Get it locally so you can guarantee fit, the 2500 bumpers don't work.
 
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crroberts

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I've looked and looked. I found one grill guard that would work with the plastic. And all of the replacements have to either be a 3/4 ton and up or the 2 piece bumper.

On your thread I saw a lot of people talking about the fog lights which had me wondering if you could just hook up a light bar or off road lights to the fog light button.
 

Burla

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Very easily, all you have to do is drill a hole to mount on the light bar and drill a hole in the tube to run the wire through. That is what that center bar is for, it is a light bar. I have my fog lights hooked up to the fog button, it was very easy I just used the existing wiring. The fog lights came with the bumper, they plug and play with the existing harness, I think they swapped an adapter, I don't remember. The entire lighting labor was the cheapest part of the entire deal and the only reason I used them was because it was a pain for me to attach their fogs to their bumper, but it was a piece of cake for the less shuab guys. You can also choose to run regular fog light like I have, and additional fogs on the light bar hooked to a different switch is what i recommend. Some off road lighting is too bright to be tied to the fog button, so you can turn it off when on coming traffic is coming and still have your standard fogs on. Also, a very easy thing to do. I haven't done this yet, but it is on my short list. I love PIAA lighting, man it is crazy how well those lights work. Maybe I will get to adding these this summer.
 
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crroberts

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I got to looking on their website earlier today and I did notice they came with the lights so that answered my own question. And I agree with the lightbar/offroad lights having a seperate switch. I always drive with my fog lights on so it would be more of a hassle than just doing it the right way.
 

JustinC

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Wowzers, I'm sorry that happened to you. I would look into ranch hand I think as well. Although wherever you go, I would call ahead to make sure the grille guard or bumper fits the dodge express. I heard that with a lot of these companies it doesn't fit the express model, but they don't tell you until it's too late. You wouldn't want to be stuck with it.
 
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crroberts

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Yeah I've seen a lot of that. They tell you it fits in one place and then another they say it doesn't. I did email ranch hand and fab fours so I'll post what they tell me when I get a reply.
 
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