10 4WD BULL BAR Factors Most People Don't Consider

bull bars rhubarbs whatever you want to call them there's steel there's aluminum there's plastic protein bars move through bars full hoop bars Center Hoop Bar nudge bar steel bumper comp bars there's a lot of bars and then there's all these variations to everything that most people just don't know or just don't understand and how the heck would you mount a winch a pair of lights and some comms to your vehicle without a bull bar a lot of people out there choose the wrong bar and it's quite understandable because there are so many options so what do you need let's get into all that right now so why do people need a bull bar in the first place well animal strikes is the number one thing that comes to mind on the highway Wildlife encounters kangaroos emus sheep goats cows but it's all about animal strikes it's also about off-roading trees logs Boulders tight bends all that kind of stuff you may encounter off-road but let's be honest 75 of tracks you're going to go forward driving on you wouldn't even need a bull bar for or a rhubarb whatever you want to call it and the third reason why people get a bull bar and not really a legitimate reason I gotta say in my opinion you want to mount lights comms and a winch you don't need a bull bar to mount those three things and we'll get to that a bit later how you're going to mount them without a bull bar but the problem is the accessory store will convince you to get a bull bar so they can easily Mount the lights or the communication or of course you winch the fourth and the most legitimate reason that I believe for you having a bull bar is the fact that you can sit on 110 kilometers per hour on the country roads and you cannot worry about the minor animal strikes look we don't want to hit anything in the first place right so something jumps out of course slow down if you can but the main point here is if you're doing the same trip without a bull bar you are going to hit something eventually I've hit many animals look sometimes it might be due to the time of the day you drive but I'll tell you right now I've hit stuff in the middle of the day when you wouldn't expect it so usually in the mornings and in the late arvos that's when I'm aware that there is more potential for animal strikes but I'm actually more aware so I'm actually looking for it more during the middle of the day that's when you actually get surprised most of the time something big will come out in front of you and all you know it same scenario without a bull bar most certainly would end your trip if it was like a 70 kilo Brew even a 50 kilo room without a bull bar that thing's just going to go through and hit all the vital components higher speed than that well it could be quite disastrous so the bull bar on that particular scenario will give you insurance for your holiday insurance for your vehicle and possibly even life insurance if you want to look at the most extreme angle of this and people do die on a rose from hitting animals also having a bull bar makes it less likely for you to try and swerve around an animal on the road never swerve when you swerve that's when you roll a vehicle or you swerve into oncoming traffic this is what's exposed behind most bumper bars if you hit a log or something pretty hard that's what's going to get crushed right away I mean there is a bit of protection here but I mean this plastic guard underneath it's pretty pathetic really that's what you are protecting with a bull bar and also up here when you have the Hoops but we'll get to the hoopless bars and how good are hooplas bars well that is a good question having a bull bar gives you that mentality of yeah you're going to be all right maybe not for Skippy though but you'll be all right let's be realistic a lot of people actually drive in the middle of the night early hours in the morning and in the afternoon and that's why we have bull bars plastic aluminum and steel let's put them up on the board and we'll compare better more we'll start with the weights first obviously plastic is going to be a lot lighter and a lot weaker then we have the aluminum bar about 30 percent lighter than your general steel bar because they've got to put a lot more into those bars and make them thicker so they can kind of be as strong as a steel but they're never going to be a stronger steel and I'll get to that a bit later if you put a winch in it then I can almost guarantee you will need a suspension upgrade there as well but if you just have the alloy bar or a plastic bar you're generally all right without a suspension upgrade and then there's steel bar with a steel bar you are more likely to require a suspension upgrade because the front of your car is going to droop you add a winch to that I can guarantee you you will need a suspension upgrade because your vehicle is going to be nosing down strength plastic not so fantastic in other words workers piece but they will bounce back so if you hit anything that's light like light strikes brushing bars and stuff your bar will bend back it has good memory so you can Flex around a bit in that sense it's pretty good but it does look like a pair of sunglasses don't you agree alloy how strong is aloe not as strong as what you think but it's not too bad to be honest I've had an aluminum bar before I've hit decent sized kangaroos but not at 110. and it was this one time I got a little bit too excited at the Lansing sand dunes and I kind of jumped my Hilux a little bit I compressed so much that the tires grabbed onto the bull bar wings and ripped it down it only took three of us six hands to bend those wings back up on my piss week aluminum Bull Bar so they do have a place but if you're after like ultimate protection that's strong Steel you're gonna need steel the steel bar there's nothing stronger than steel you hit something with a steel bar it won't shift too much it won't Bend too much it shouldn't crack I've hit a lot of things with my bull bars other than animals and it's generally all right you get a few dings and stuff it might shift on the on the vehicle itself a little bit but so will all the other bars too so steel would be the man of steel alloy would be this guy and plastic will be a bit of Tupperware so you have a clearer image of it this is a traditional bar this is a center Hoop Bar which is commonly known as the Sahara Bar at ARB and this is a steel bar with no hoops at all full Hoop Bar everything's protected kangaroos that are about my height which is like the Big Reds or even a bit lower to me Central gravity is about here smack into it that will smack straight into here if you don't have that so basically all your cooling system is going to get pushed into your motor you're going nowhere if you only have a center hoop then your headlights are on Jeopardy you can still continue on your journey now you can still continue your trip you'll still be fairly safe and you can still limp the car in some way or get home it will not even limp you'll still be able to drive it you just will be a headlight down if you have no Hoops however and you've just got a steel bar so that means all this stuff ends here you've got a kangaroo that's a big one or an emu straight through the motor so those types of bars I know they look cool some people think they look cool a lot of people actually think they look cool I don't know how many people think they look cool do you think they look cool I don't really like them but some you're nodding he likes them anyway regardless if you like them or not they're not really meant for out in the bush because all this is not protected when you don't have hoops on your bars I'm sure pedestrians will prefer to be hit by it but let's not hit pedestrians at all I don't even know why I mentioned that let's cut that bit out nudge bars white even a thing I'm in a while I'm talking about nudge bars because they're absolutely useless the only reason I will put a nudge bar on a vehicle is if I didn't want to put all the weight in the front and I want it somewhere to hold UHF antenna a set of spotlights or a light bar that is the only reason why I would ever put a nudge bar on a vehicle I've had a nudge bar before I saw a green light that guy in front of me didn't take off nudged him at like five kilometers per hour it caved it right in to my vehicle a nudge bar is absolutely useless don't even bother if you're looking at one for protection number one the two poster bar that's your regular bar the commercial bar also the recreational bar and your Deluxe bar is just a fancier version that has more tabs than amount of things too or just looks a bit prettier and a bit nicer on your vehicle then we go to the three poster four poster five poster these are your far north Northern Territory far enough Kimberley far North Queensland where there are some big bloody Kangaroos and you are expecting to hit things quite regularly These Bars however are not great for off-roading because your approach angle will be absolutely terrible they hang down so far to protect your vehicle you're now going to get hung up on things basically not be able to approach things and usually you'll find out on trucks like road trains or BNS vehicles or BNS Utes actually with lots of aerial whips on it and flags and bug deflectors do beauty is in the eye of the beholder plastic well in my eyes it looks goofy as it's like putting a thick frame around it it just looks ridiculous in my in my opinion okay but my opinion shouldn't matter if you like that kind of thing the looks of aluminum so what I was trying to say was let's talk about aluminum looks wise if you like the look of chrome then that's probably up your Alleyway and when you come to Steel look they can also look a bit over the top some might say I actually don't want to look at this but many people do not like the look of these type of bars but at the end of the day looks shouldn't be how you choose your bull bar that should be the third Factor the first Factor being the protection the second Factor being functionality and then comes in the third Factor the looks and if you go for something like steel there are many more options so you can probably get all three of those boxes ticked and you'll be happy about it when it comes to adding options to your bars and also repairing them plastic let's not even talk about that because there's not much you can add to it or repair on them if a plastic bar stuffed it is stuffed not to mention it'll probably fade too when it comes to an alloy bar if you want to add an extra tab to mount something on it's a bit more involved you're going to need a TIG welder when it comes to steel bar however if you can weld into your backyard you can add one yourself it's easier to repair a steel bar and add things to a steel bar than it is on an aluminum bar not to mention touching up the paint is easier on a steel bath than it is on an aluminum bar painting the bar on an aloe bar is a little bit more difficult and if you get stone chips it's going to chip the paint a lot faster than it will on a steel bar side note with bull bars when you get a bull bar installed from the accessory store just get under there and check check all the bolts so those bull bars there are some bolts on the inside this bar we're taking off the accessory store who put this on have not done them up very tight at all it was just above finger tight I could take it off this whereas the other ones I used as a rattle gun good reason to do DIY because you know how tight the bolts are that you put on because that was pathetic lucky there's a lot of bolts holding this thing Bull Bar recovery points as stupid as this sounds some bull bars have recovery points on them that shouldn't be used because they're more like for a toe Point whereas some bull bars the way they're fitted you can use the recovery points because they are mounted to the chassis in a particular way do you have recovery points on your bull bar and can you trust them or use them that is the ultimate question one Telltale sign is the fact that they're quite thick the other one is how is a bull bar mounted this particular bar is mounted different than the one I took off all the mounting points are directly on the chassis only on both sides there are so many bolts in there whereas the other one it had less bolts in the chassis and had some extra bolts in the wings on both sides which are not adequate for pull stresses or shock loads on the bar so this bar in particular I would trust as a recovery point because where it's mounted it is Rock Solid and whereas mounted is also where you would mount a recovery point so therefore or trusses bar winch compatible versus non-winch compatible all I can say here folks is just get a winch compatible bar especially if it's for recreational purposes because even if you are not going to put a winch on it later on you will have a better resale value on your vehicle it'll be easier to sell because if someone's looking for a vehicle to set up as a mad tourer and they see your vehicle advertised and then they realize hang on that's not a winch compatible bar I'm going to go for this other option instead because that you would have to change the bar itself or modified a bar to fit a winch so if you are going to go for a bull bar just get the winch compatible bar and if you want to change your mind later on you can always fit a winch our chip bars or cheap bull bars or cheap Brands as good as the well-known Brands like ARB tjm and opposite lock just to name the three most recognized ones the short answer is no definitely not some of these companies I'll say in particular ARB because I I know this they manufacture themselves they also do a lot of testing and they are airbag compatible and all those things those are the things you need to look for ADR compliance as well so you need to make sure that your bull bar is actually legitimately legal and it has been tested for impact or it actually does what it needs to do in saying that a lesser known bull bars that are good are they as good as the well-known bull bars short answer to that is yes they are because there are some lesser-known Brands out there that just focus all their energy making bull bars and actually make some really good stuff but there are also some options you've got to be careful of the general rule of thumb that I go by with a steel bar in particular and that is the weight if you go and check out a bar if you can and still buy in particular go to lift it up because if it's really light it's probably not going to protect your car as well as what they might say it will and I've picked the bar up like this before I'm not going to mention a brand name I was actually really keen on putting that on my vehicle I went and picked it up when I had the opportunity when I was out of mates Workshop the winch weighed more than the bar and the bar was super light I couldn't believe it and it was a steel bar no way I was ever going to put that bar on my vehicle the weight is a good indicator of how strong that bar might be the small things in life are important and that also goes with bull bars and when I say small things the fact that you have mounting tabs on your bar look I'm not one to use those personally up on the top hoop but many people do antennas light bars things like that also on the actual bar itself the loader Hoops or even if you have a hopeless one do you have mounting points here or holes pre-drilled for your lights as well those little things matter and taking it further down what a number plate is if I was to use my winch right now I would crack my number plate because there's nowhere really to put it but there is a trick to that on my 79 as you can see right now I have a flip up number plate there are two reasons why you have that one is for winching the Rope doesn't hit your plate or gets cut on the plate or ruins your plate because this is my Plate's acrylic but if you had a metal one it could slice into the Rope you don't want that number two when you go through a water crossing regardless if you have a winch or not that water goes in in to this area here and then gets forced back out and often you'll find that people lose their number plates in River Crossings so having those flip up plates absolutely must have if you have a bull bar additional two to small things in the life of a bull bar does yours have a high lift jacking point for example not all bars do this one doesn't but the FJ out there does have one so if that's an important factor to you then that's something you need to consider what this one does have instead is a race hitch receiver Mount so you can actually mount something in here like a tube then I can jack it up with that but that's going to be a bit of a nightmare so there are not really any options to Jack this vehicle up with this type of bull bar what if you don't have a bullet Bull Bar where the heck are you going to mount everything there's a couple of solutions as you'll see here I've been busy mounting things to My Land Cruiser now I'll just put the antenna here to show that most people normally Mount their antenna on the bull bar I don't I mounted to the roof so that's one other place you can mount an antenna if you don't have a bull bar second option to mount your antenna without a bull bar that will be on the front fender here between the fender and the bonnets as you'll see right now as well what about lights lights can be a bit more tricky but there is a solution if you don't want a bull bar but don't have a bull bar this is a 75 prop I've bought here just to show you guys it's always best to have it in hand number plate mounts to the front of your car place a light here and a light there probably not lights that are this big but you can get two lights on there so that is the cheapest option you can find if you want to mount lights to your vehicle without a bull bar but there is another way you can get a nudge bar nudge bars are a bit more robust for holding things and a nudge bar can accommodate for an antenna two lights but I think a winch the other option you also have is behind the grill now I've done this on my NAD Hilux when I used to have it and there were just some homemade fabricated by hand brackets which we were able to place behind The Grille and it was kind of like still flights it was actually really cool how about a winch how are you going to mount a winch to your vehicle without a bull bar it's possible it's doable but it is oh there's some custom work involved some vehicles have options for it to be honest if you're going to go down the line of a winch just buy yourself a bull bar that's what I'm going to say but it is possible legality is your bar legal and how would you know well to answer those questions I've pulled someone in specifically now this is Luke from one track fabrication the reason why I've called him in is because he stretches cars He chops cars he does a whole heap of stuff to vehicles that needs to be approved and pit inspected ADR approved so look go running here you go let's talk legalities yeah fun putting a custom bull bar on a modern vehicle with front airbags is illegal because if you have a crash the airbags may not deploy it could leave the manufacturer of the bull bar liable if the person dies or is seriously injured a bull bar shape needs to be built to a certain way for pedestrian safety if you have a look at the link behind me this will show you the what the correct way a bar should be built for pedestrian safety and to get past over the pits or be legal on your vehicle thus making competition bull bars pretty much not legal for the straight with the shape of a bull bar there's lots of different angles Heights and sizes it has to comply with you may not ever hit anyone you may not have a crash in it but it also may not ever pass the pit if you ever have to get your carpet inspected modifying a bull bar is technically illegal because if it is a compliant bar with airbags and everything else if you modify that bar or you know bolt accessories like aftermarket scrub bars they don't like aren't compatible with that bar technically your bar is no longer airbag compatible because you have modified it from the manufacturer's spec another thing that a lot of people don't know about is you're not allowed to bolt sausage makers AKA fishing rod holders like what's behind me because I protrude and can injure someone seriously and make sausages here's a link behind me for the West Australian laws and legalities of bull bars and hopefully Ronnie here can find the other states and territories of Australia so you know what you can and can't do in your state or territory thank you very much Luke and on the screen right there or the chalkboard sorry are all the other links to every state and territory it's also down in the description below if you need to have a look but you mainly what you should be concerned about especially in wa is if you are going for a five poster Bull Bar just double check those ones most of them should be okay but some may not be and then there's also the brands that you may not have heard about before just check those as well just check it so you know you're safe cheers thanks for watching hopefully you pick your up Bull Bar see you later

Channel: Ronny Dahl

Views: 302,311

Keywords: Off-road, tracks, 4wheeling, adventure, 4x4-off-road, bull bar, 4x4 accessories, bull bar review, bull bar installation, bull bar crash, hilux bull bar, ranger bull bar, 70 series bull bar, landcruiser bull bar, bull bar hoops, frontal protection, 4wd bull bar, 4x4 bull bar, bull bar on car, best bull bar, which bull bar, steel vs alloy, steel bull bar vs alloy, alloy vs steel bull bar, kangaroo vs bull bar, vehicle insurance, bull bar mods, 4wd mods, 4x4 mods

Id: JeJtOMSUN5s

Length: 21min 28sec (1288 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 04 2023