The Abominable Bolt predicament!

[OverlanderJK]

He mentions that the bolts were welded to the bumper, so it's possible whoever welded the bolts "reverse heat-treated" the bolts in the welding process. There was also mention of the bolts stripping, not breaking, which raises the possibility that the bolts were cross threaded (and just cranked down with an impact wrench)

I’ve never seen bolts welded to a bumper. I don’t even need to watch it to realize that dude is probably retarded.

 

[Disciple Off Road]

I have to agree that there is more to the story than being shown. I have to assume this bumper like some that already have the bolts installed on the bumper where the bolt head is welded on the inside. So you basically slide the bumper into the frame rails and install the nuts.

What I was waiting for was to see pics/video of the inside of the Motobilt bumper where the bolts come through and/or see the bolts themselves. You can clearly see the frame rails have zero damage.

FYI the break happens at 0:46

 

[wayoflife]

He mentions that the bolts were welded to the bumper, so it's possible whoever welded the bolts "reverse heat-treated" the bolts in the welding process. There was also mention of the bolts stripping, not breaking, which raises the possibility that the bolts were cross threaded (and just cranked down with an impact wrench)

If the bolts were welded to the bumper, then the bumper is a pretty shitty design and or manufactured poorly. Bolts are rated for tensile strength and the only time I've seen bolts strip is if the they or the nuts were the wrong size or weren't tightened to the proper torque spec. Either way, there's a lot more that was wrong with the bumper, hardware used or install then is being shown here.

 

[WJCO]

Communist bolts and/or shitty workmanship. Final answer. For that reason, I'm out.

 

[GP NOIR]

One reason bumper failed is because all the fasteners are under tension. None were in shear. A recovery point is stronger when the mounting bolts are in shear because fasteners are stronger under shear forces than tension forces.

It was mentioned in the video the bolt threads failed. Either the bolts were not strong enough (probably too soft) or the nuts were improperly torqued during installation. It's possible the bolts were annealed or embrittled during the welding process. I'm leaning towards the bolts being too soft because it was a "slow" failure. The bumper sort of peeled away from it's mount rather than breaking away with a sharp snap.

 

[jeeeep]

I thought I would put the link to the video up so you could see what I was talking about. Like a couple guys have stated, I had never seen this happen either. You can see it (the bumper ripped from the truck frame) at the 46:14 mark. Thanks.

hmm, gotta question the intelligence of the guy reaching under the bumper held by a single bolt to grab nuts.
Also, he dropped to his knees pretty quick...

 

[CalSgt]

Honestly, it really doesn't matter what bumper was installed or at least, from what I saw and unless the first one only uses 2 bolts on each side of the frame rails to secure it in place and or uses POS china bolts of supposed grade 8 quality or less. If that were the case, then yeah, the first bumper was a POS design and should NEVER be allowed to be sold!!

And, so that it isn't missed, factory bolts are great and do not need to be replaced.

I wonder if someone put the wrong nuts on there.,. Like that oddball metric/SAE combo that thread together but the nut will wiggle

that or this whole thing is fake attention whoring for views.

 

[TopoPilot]

I wonder if someone put the wrong nuts on there.,. Like that oddball metric/SAE combo that thread together but the nut will wiggle

that or this whole thing is fake attention whoring for views.

I have been watching this kid (when I have time) for a while. He tries pretty hard to get it right. He works at it every single day and is trying to raise his kids in the right way. He has a few hundred thousand people who subscribe to his channel and it is interesting. I'm not so sure he had his recovery winch ripped from his vehicle just for clicks. I guess I could be wrong, I have been in the past, I'm working on it. I shared it because I was surprised by what happened. Hopefully, we all glean something insightful from it. In the meantime, here's to giving it our best shot, every. Single. Day.


Topo.